Brian Robertson’s time in Motörhead is one of the most intriguing chapters in the band’s history, and while his brightly-colored hotpants proved contentious, he was able to sneak guitar synths into his one album with the band, and he has a guitar legend to thank for that.

When “Fast” Eddie Clarke left the band in the middle of the Iron Fist tour, they turned to the former Thin Lizzy guitarist for assistance. After filling in on tour, he ultimately earned a permanent place in the band, featuring on 1983’s Another Perfect Day, which would be their last record as a power trio until 1996’s Overnight Sensation.

Naturally, Robertson’s ultra-rare hollow-bodied 1953 Les Paul came along for the ride. The guitar was customized by Les Paul himself for his wife, Mary Ford, who found the usual design too heavy. Robertson had purchased it upon joining Lizzy in 1974, and it became the center of an important guitar swap.

“I used it on two gigs [with Lizzy],” he tells Guitarist, having bought it off Mott the Hoople/Bad Company riffer, Mick Ralphs.

“It was dreadful because it fed back,” he reveals. “But it looked great, Burgundy red-ish. I had to have it, even though it had a Bigsby. My contention was that we needed a spare, which is bollocks because you couldn’t use it live. Plus, with the Bigsby, if you broke a string, it’d take you an hour and a half to change it.”

The guitar featured on Lizzy’s classic, Jailbreak, and, he says, anything that needed slide guitar, but Jeff Beck soon had it in his crosshairs.

“We were rehearsing together in [London rehearsal/recording studio] Nomis Studios,” Robertson explains. “I was rehearsing with Motörhead. I wanted to know how he got that top note on Cause We’ve Ended As Lovers, and he said, ‘It’s a guitar synth.’ I started joking, ‘You can have that if you give me your Roland guitar synth.’”

If you don’t ask in life, you don’t get. Fortunately for Robertson, Beck was game.

“He let me use the guitar synth while he had the Les Paul,” he smiles. “That’s how I got into using the guitar synths with Motörhead.”

In Joel McIver’s book Overkill: The Untold Story of Motörhead, Lemmy is quoted as saying that Robertson helped make the band “more musical,” but despite helping turn over a new leaf for the band, in the wake of their adrenalized heavy blues rock with Clarke, he left after just one year.

That paved the way for the late Phil Campbell and Michael “Würzel” Burston to form a fiery guitar tandem that lasted for around a decade, producing some of the densest-sounding Motörhead records in their exhaustive discography.

Robertson, in truth, knew his stint in the band was doomed, and he also knew what Lizzy lost when he stepped aside in 1978, yet he played a pivotal role in the histories of both hugely celebrated rock bands. And he did so with some rarified six-strings for company.

For the interview with Robertson, and to read about the unearthing of a classic Cream-era Eric Clapton guitar, pick up issue 539 of Guitarist from Magazines Direct.

Fresh off the announcement of his Marshall endorsement, Jared James Nichols is taking it back to his roots – and by that, we mean the very reason he decided to ditch the pick and play fingerstyle exclusively, in a journey that took him from rural Wisconsin to world stages.

“I remember the first guitar I picked up, I picked it up, and I wanted to play it like a lefty. The first real guitar I got, though, the guy at the store was ‘Dude, flip the guitar, you're holding it wrong,” he says in his new Gibson documentary, The Long Road: A Jared James Nichols Documentary.

“He was like, ‘If you want to be a real guitar player and play really good guitars, you got to play righty. They don't really make great left-handed guitars.’”

Nichols was 15 at the time, and while he quickly got used to his newly purchased right-handed guitar, one thing that felt unnatural to him was playing it with a pick.

“It was fucking me up,” he says matter-of-factly, “and I needed to feel the strings under my fingers. I started to play without a pick, and I distinctly remember people telling me, ‘Man, it's never gonna work, you're never gonna be a great guitar player without a pick.’”

Discovering “guys like Jeff Beck and Mark Knopfler and Derek Trucks,” was the epiphany that he needed to stick to his own unique brand of fingerstyle playing.

“I was like, ‘Well, they do it,’ and then I just started to kind of do it my own way. No one taught me how to do it. I just said I don’t care. I’m just gonna try and see what happens. And what ended up happening was, I started to develop my own sound and technique with it, and I’m so happy now that I did.”

In one of his Guitar World columns, Nichols broke down his one-of-a-kind fingerstyle technique and waxed lyrical about the players who inspired him.

“Fingerpicking felt like the most natural approach. I use my thumb for downstrokes and my first three fingers for upstrokes,” he wrote.

“There was one player in particular who inspired me the most in regard to playing fingerstyle, and that was blues legend Hubert Sumlin, who was known most notably for his work with Howlin’ Wolf.

“When I heard Hubert play, it changed the way I approached the guitar. Then I heard Albert King, Derek Trucks, and Mark Knopfler, all fingerpickers. All these players demonstrated the incredible range of sounds available when fingerpicking.”

Jeff Beck was playing in the Yardbirds when Jimi Hendrix first came to London and sent shockwaves through the British blues scene. His impact was so big that it left Beck wondering if he should hang up his Les Paul for good.

He survived the scare, ultimately releasing 1975’s faultless Blow by Blow – a watershed moment for instrumental guitar music. But when his solo band collapsed, and the shred scene rose to prominence, Beck, once again, began to doubt himself.

“The last nine years were rough for music,” he told Chris Gill in an interview for Japan’s Player magazine (available via Guitar World), in 1999.

At that time, a decade had passed between his three-piece band album Jeff Beck’s Guitar Shop record and his seventh LP, Who Else!, with only session work and covers albums bridging the gap.

“It has been jumping around all over the place, like a fox,” he explained. “I could never tell where anything was going to go. I was also really depressed about not being able to keep the original three-piece band together: me, Tony Hymas [keys], and Terry Bozzio [drums].”

However, Beck also revealed that the guitar arms race of the late-’80s had gotten to him.

“I got really disillusioned with my playing,” he explained. “I knew that there were these other guitarists coming up around the block, and they could really play.

“[It was] not a threat. It was just telling me that it was time to move on. I wasn’t going to let that happen. But they did shove me aside for a while. I just thought that I should be an observer rather than a participant.”

In the end, Beck weathered the storm and forged a successful – and surprise – tandem with Jennifer Batten on the techno-infused Who Else!, before going on to release four more albums of original music before his passing in 2023.

His insecurities never went away entirely, but it’s a useful lesson for us mortal guitarists to realize that, no matter your stature, every player experiences doubts.

Or at least, every player except for Yngwie Malmsteen.

• For more in-depth insight on Jeff Beck’s lifelong evolution as a guitarist, check out the forthcoming biography, Blow By Blow - The Jeff Beck Story (on sale July 14), which features a wealth of original interviews from Guitar World veterans Chris Gill and Brad Tolinski.

When guitar players hear the words “blues power,” they will usually cast their minds back to the late Sixties and early Seventies, when trailblazers like Albert King and Eric Clapton were using such terms to convey the emotional gravitas as well as the historic and humanistic weight deeply encased within the music.

All these years later, out of the younger generation, it’s Jared James Nichols who has been using the phrase to carry that legacy on, telling stories and hitting people in the heart with every strum and bend.

The singer/guitarist’s latest album, Louder Than Fate, carries many of his signature trademarks, while also surprising listeners by exploring new sonic ground that crosses the line past southern rock and into country.

That’s not the only way he’s chosen to step things up this time round – part of the album was recorded at Studio 606, the private facility and creative hub owned by Foo Fighters, with super producer Jay Ruston (Corey Taylor, Anthrax, Steel Panther) bringing his many years of expertise behind the desk.

Then there are the external producers and songwriters that Nichols enlisted to help avoid some of the common trappings and obstacles that almost every blues player faces in this day and age.

All in all, this is the most well-rounded Jared James Nichols album to date, taking us on a journey unlike anything he’s released before.

What did you learn from working with writers and producers like Roger Alan Nichols and Skip Black?

I think it was Brad Paisley who said how guitar players often cater their songs towards the solos or the riff. It’s a hard habit to break, because you make a structure and then play the shit out of it. I’ve been trying to prove myself constantly because when you get billed as some hotshot player, people will stand in front of you with their arms crossed as if to say, “Prove it”.

There’s this whole stigma around being the guy who can show everyone he can play. This time, I was rubbing elbows with people who had worked with some of the world’s greatest musicians. And not only that, these people just want to write songs.

They’d be like, “Oh yeah, another guitar player”. They didn’t care. Walking into those rooms gave me a completely different mindset. It was a challenge because I was working with people more experienced than me.

This record feels like a huge learning curve for you.

Dude, I got to do a huge chunk of it at Studio 606. Our drummer was using Taylor Hawkins’ kits. I was playing through Dave Grohl’s cabinets. We were going through the Sound City board. There was such a vibe in there. I felt like I was getting schooled the whole time.

One thing I learned is that you don’t need as much gain as you think you need for riffing. I started playing with my gain decked and thought it sounded cool. But when I walked into the control room, Jay was like, “Have you got a pedal on?” and told me to turn it off.

I was a little scared at first, but when I did, I could hear more of an old school vibe. Like if you listen to the classic stuff from the ‘60s and ‘70s, those Plexis aren’t as gainy as you might think. The tones were defined and muscular, but not washed out with overdrive and reverb.

So how did all of this affect how you actually play?

I remember working on a song called Looks Like That Felt Good. The Drop D riff is super easy, we kept it simplistic because I imagined myself in a venue playing with the drums.

Roger was the producer for that one and he kept hitting the spacebar, telling me to stop sliding into everything. Sometimes there are these things we do as guitar players – sliding makes things sound more slurred and bluesy, but some riffs need to hit straight. He told me to stop that and lose the vibrato.

Again, I was a bit unsure, but lo and behold his advice made sense. You learn things like that, which go a bit deeper than the big licks. It’s the little stylistic elements that fly under the radar, but when you pay attention, you’ll be glad you did.

Songs like Bending Or Breaking, Killing Time, and Show Me seem to showcase this whole different side to you.

That’s the thing about being in a room with people who aren’t into what you’re into. You learn more. It ended up being the perfect sauce. As an artist there comes a point where you have to let go of your insecurities. I did a lot of that on this record.

At one point I had to ask myself, ‘Am I going to be able to do this?’ It was like showing a whole other side of music that I love but have never had the guts to do.

Those dudes exist big-time in the country world and pushed me into finding my footing in stuff I wouldn’t have taken on without them. We’ve been playing these songs in the set and it’s great to see the change of pace. People have been like, “Damn, Jared’s not just ripping my head off for 80 minutes”.

There are, however, moments on this album where you still do. The first song, Let’s Go, has some Richie Kotzen-style barred pentatonic ideas.

I love Richie’s playing so much. I was lucky enough to tour with him in The Winery Dogs and we ended up hanging out a lot. I remember listening to him when I was 20 years old and thinking, ‘What the fuck?!’ And it’s the same with other legends like Paul Gilbert or Michael Schenker.

Whenever I tour with people like that, some of their licks end up in my playing. I just can’t help it. Even John 5, who is someone I’ve done over 100 shows with, ended up creeping into my playing because it was like we were drinking the same water.

Which of the new solos are you most proud of?

Nothing on the record was really contrived, it was all still from a shoot-from-the-hip mindset. But the solo in Killing Time was a first pass. I was listening to the backing track the night before, it’s this crescendo build in E Minor, just this basic thing. I started humming ideas that felt almost more like David Gilmour territory.

In the end, I played it through a 1969 Plexi with my Klon, using my Dorothy guitar, which is my really old Goldtop from 1952. The Klon was on with zero gain but I went to the amp and turned the volume all the way up.

I love solos that have some composition, these little waves of writing, but they also feel like they’ve been improvised. That’s where this one lives. It has the fiery spitball of “Cmon guys, let’s play”, but you can still hear how it follows the changes nicely.

What else are we hearing on this album? You tend to be quite minimal when it comes to gear.

It’s not a long list beyond the cable (laughs). I had the Plexi and this special amp from Blackstar that’s a one-of-one point-to-point handwired Series One. I was told they’d made it for Jeff Beck but for some reason they never got it to him. It’s more aggressive than the Plexi, like an old JCM800.

I used my Tube Screamer for a couple of things. For Runnin’ Hot, I borrowed this [Electro-Harmonix Small Stone] big box phaser from the early ‘80s. It gave some rhythms a bit more movement. The main guitars were Dorothy and this Korina Futura I got from Gibson for all the big-ass humbucker parts. I didn’t have to search much when it came to tone. It’s funny, I remember doing this track with Joe Bonamassa and he brought his whole rig over, saying to use whatever I needed.

I brought my Marshall head, Dorothy and my Klon and started testing out tones with my stuff before asking him what I should try. His answer was “I think you should stay there”. That was it. I try not to overcomplicate things.

Speaking of Joe, you recently went to his house to film a video on Gary Moore’s 1989 Soldano SLO-100 head, which he’d recently acquired.

Joe must have balls of steel because when we got there, the amp hadn’t been serviced or even turned on. It literally just showed up in a shipping crate. It was a bit like finding a classic muscle car, sticking some gas in, and firing it up. Joe was cranking it right away with a 1959 Les Paul.

In the video you can see the power sizzle down, shut off, and then come back. It did that a few times. It’s like we were feeling Gary Moore’s spirit in the room. I feel pretty spoiled when I think about all the cool shit I get to be around.

I also did a video on Gary’s JTM45 Bluesbreaker, which another friend got at auction. I own Gary’s original Guv'nor pedal, so we used that with a 1959 Les Paul. Here’s the crazy shit, the power went out four times, which has never happened before. Then this horrible rainstorm came. Something weird and energetic happened. I got the chills and remember saying, “Dude, I think Gary Moore’s here.”

You posted a picture not long ago of yourself as a teenager wearing a Sabbath Bloody Sabbath shirt, proudly holding your first Les Paul in front of your bedroom Marshall rig. That kid has come a long way.

I wouldn’t change a thing. Every time I screwed up or took a wrong turn, from bands breaking up and me getting depressed or whatever, it’s all led to this path of understanding. Everything boils down to hard work. To be honest, I’m still that kid in a Sabbath Bloody Sabbath shirt holding the Les Paul in front of the Marshall.

If I was able to put in the work and get to where I am today, then so can anyone. There were times were I was crashing on floors, living on 10 bucks a week with no gigs booked. I would walk around streets late at night trying to listen out for bands just to see if I could jam with them.

It’s easy to get discouraged. You might not be as fast as you like or have loads of followers online. But it just comes down to how bad you want it. Are you prepared to go through all of the shit to come out the other side? I stuck to my guns, playing the music that I love.

• Louder Than Fate is out June 6 via Frontiers
• This article first appeared in Guitar World. Subscribe and save.

While the Yardbirds are rightly famed for having kickstarted the careers of three British guitar legends – Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, and Jimmy Page – the band was far more than a mere nursery for six-string superstars.

Their freewheeling mid-song interludes (dubbed “rave-ups”), deft combination of blues and harder-edged sensibilities, and willingness to engage with non-mainstream ideas such as Gregorian chant exerted a powerful influence on their mid-'60s contemporaries and presaged many developments in the worlds of experimental and heavy rock.

In its heyday, the group enjoyed success on both sides of the Atlantic with such hits as For Your Love, Heart Full of Soul, and Shapes of Things.

Like many other low-enders, the band's founding bassist, Paul Samwell-Smith, started out as a guitarist. “When the Yardbirds started, under the name of the Metropolis Blues Quartet, Keith Relf was playing guitar, and playing rather well,” said Samwell-Smith in the March 2017 issue of Bass Player. “So I volunteered to play the bass – well, someone had to!”

The Surrey, England-born musician cites Ricky Fenson of the Cyril Davies Band as an early influence. “He blew my mind when I watched them play. I copied much of his style, as did others, including Bill Wyman.”

The Yardbirds' first studio album, Yardbirds – a.k.a. Roger the Engineer and released in the States as Over Under Sideways Down – opens with Lost Woman, a riff-based number that features a prime example of the band’s rave-up style.

Samwell-Smith – who also served as the album's co-producer – believes the song was likely recorded live in one take, with the bass guitar sound captured using a miked Marshall rig comprising an amp and a four-speaker unit.

“I used my Epiphone Rivoli bass, a short-scale model that I used for everything, and which made it easier to play chords. In fact, I found it easier all around to reach the notes – those long-scale Fender Jazz models sounded fantastic, but they scared the hell out of me. I used black nylon tapewound strings to reduce the friction, as I played a lot of chords and slid up and down the fretboard a lot. I found with wire-wound strings I'd wear my fingers down.”

Following a hi-hat count-off, the bass announces the song's foundational hook: a bobbing pick-plucked riff built around the G minor pentatonic scale. This riff continues through the guitar-free intro and verse, accompanied by drummer Jim McCarty's throbbing tom-tom ostinato and Relf's vocals.

Samwell-Smith changes tack for the chorus, deploying root-5th power chords (enlivened by an occasional 6th) while adding beat four color to the C and D chords with a minor-3rd-to-major-3rd half-step. “These are the classic Jimmy Reed-type blues chords, which I used a lot.”

Following a repeat of the verse and chorus, the song segues into the rave-up section at 00:51 via the pivotal D7#9 chord. Here, the bass, harmonica, and a single guitar hammer out a snappy unison line. Dig how the bass duplicates the bluesy bends of the guitar and harmonica throughout this section. “That was me just trying to be a guitar player, yet again.”

At 01:21, the bass drops to a low, 3rd-fret G, heralding a slow, whole-note climb up the G minor pentatonic scale that extends under Relf's wailing harp solo and Jeff Beck's off-the-cuff axe-work.

Samwell-Smith takes over Dreja's hypnotic 16th-note G's at 02:06, gradually adding in the 5th and octave above, as the rave-up careens toward an abrupt climax. This is followed by a return to the main riff at 02:39, and a recap of the verse and chorus before closing out over a raucous G9 chord at 03:05.

Regarding the band's slow-build interludes, Samwell-Smith explained: “It was something we always did in our live performances, so it was easy to agree on the basic shape of the improvised part and make it up on the spot. It relied on eye contact to indicate when the rave should end and the riff come back, which was usually me, since I had to get back to the riff double-sharp.”

Samwell-Smith quit the band shortly after finishing the Yardbirds album to pursue a career as a producer, later working with such artists as Carly Simon, All About Eve, Cat Stevens, and Jethro Tull. “I was so tired of touring endlessly, always traveling for hours to a gig miles from anywhere.

Making the album was a brief period of sanity for me; I think we spent five consecutive days in the studio, and I loved it. It was definitely what I wanted to do. So when we finished the album and went back on the road, I realized that I had to change my job.”

In the mid-'80s, however, Samwell-Smith teamed up again with Yardbirds founding members Dreja and McCarty to form Box of Frogs, which recorded two blues-rock albums featuring a host of musical buddies, including Beck and Page.

Suzi Quatro has never been an artist to sit shyly in the corner, and her impromptu jam with Jeff Beck and Cozy Powell while still a teenager proves just that.

Quatro, 75, was a trailblazer for women in rock when she first burst onto the scene with her self-titled debut album in 1973. An expansive tour opening for Alice Cooper soon followed, helping establish her in a male-dominated genre.

But even before she was a solo artist, she was doing everything she could to throw down the gauntlet. When she heard that producer Mickie Most (the Jeff Beck Group, the Animals, Hot Chocolate) was coming in town to record at Motown Studios with Jeff Beck and Cozy Powell, they were convinced to go see her family band, Cradle.

“This is a great story,” she tells Rock & Roll High School. “We do our set, and I was Miss Attitude with a vengeance. I didn't hear this till years later, but Jeff Beck apparently nudged Mickie while I was playing and singing, and he went, ‘Mickie, bass player,’ Mickie said, ‘I got it already.’ So when we were done, Mickie motioned for me to come back, and we sat in the little seats there, and he said, ‘I want to record you in London.’”

But just impressing influential people wasn’t enough. She wanted to prove her worth alongside them. Most invited her down to Motown Studios after the gig, and she seized her chance to play with two elite-level musicians without an ounce of fear.

“I didn't stop and think about it,” she recalls. “I'm up in the control room with the three guys, and I look down, and I see the empty pit, and I see a bass guitar against the wall. Me being me I said, ‘Right, I’m gonna show you guys what I’ve got.’ Well, I started to play, and then Jeff came down, and then Cozy came down, and we started doing [the Meters song] Cissy Strut.”

The pit was a room already fabled for the number of funk classics it had produced. Not to mention that the bass guitar she'd grabbed belonged to James Jamerson.

“How cool is that?” Quatro says. “How many musicians can say that?”

Jamerson is her primary influence, and she was practically “weaned” on his records. During an early meeting with the low-end legend, he told her that her playing wasn’t bad “for a white chick.”

For a generation of musicians, Quatro was one of the few female role models in the rock world, and she paved the way for bands like Girlschool, who worshipped at her altar, to follow in her footsteps.

The life of a rock star isn’t all rehearsals and touring, recording take after take in the studio, then doing the press tour, interviews, all work and hustle. Sometimes – very occasionally – these cats like to party. And few could put on a party like the late Jeff Beck.

Well, at least according to Dweezil Zappa’s telling. Speaking to GW columnist Jared James Nichols and Tyler Larson on the No Cover Charge Podcast, he recounted a remarkable evening in the company of Beck, when he was not only made a knight of the realm by the late guitar icon, but witnessed something terrible happening to – quite possibly – one of the oldest Fender Stratocasters in existence.

“I was at Jeff Beck’s house for a costume part of all things. I went there dressed as King Arthur, in real chainmail, so it weighed… It was heavy!” says Zappa. “I get to the door, he opens the door, and he’s also like King Arthur, but he has a sword, and he knights me at the door!”

So far so very normal. Just so long as no-one wants to use the pool. That chain mail would be a safety hazard for real. And pray tell, Dweezil, is it easy to adjust after attending the restroom? Anyways, back to the party.

“Later in the party, he’s like, ‘Oh, let me show you this guitar.’ And he had this Stratocaster. He’s like, ‘It’s a really early Stratocaster. I don’t remember exactly what number,’ picking it up to look at the backplate,” continues Zappa. Spoilers for what’s to come: it was a really early Stratocaster, like, made out of the oak from the roundtable old…

Vintage guitar enthusiasts look away now.

“As he picks it up, he hits the corner of a stone table and puts a huge ding in it. He looks at it, and then he just hands it to me, ‘cos he just didn’t care,” says Zappa. “And the serial number was #000001. He said, ‘I got this from Steve Marriott. ‘And it was like some crazy, early version. It had some Jeff Beck grease at that point.”

Was it the first serial-numbered Strat? Not according to Guitarist magazine’s consulting expert on all things vintage guitar, David Davidson of Well Strung Guitars, in Farmingdale, NY. Speaking to Guitar Player in 2021, he spoke of his FOMO at having missed on the first serial-numbered Strat (#0100, with body and neck both dated January, 1954) that was sold a few years previous by Gruhn.

“It was marked up at a price I thought was ambitious at the time, but would love to buy it now!” said Davidson. “Because it’s really the first serial numbered Strat. Is it the first Stratocaster? No, it’s not. Is it the first serial numbered Strat? Yes, it is.”

Could the bold Dweezil have been mistaken with the serial number, perhaps after a glass of mead or whatever they serve at these social engagements? We could not say. But what is interesting about these old first-years Strats is that they are all different.

“I’ve had 0102, 0103, 0112, 0117, 0108, 0158, 0168 and 0194, and I can tell you every one of those guitars is memorable,” said Davidson. “More memorable than the distinctions between one ’Burst and another. Each one is distinctly different.

“The neck shapes and edges are different. They’re all cut the same, but the hand-finishing process seems to vary. I think there were possibly way too many cooks in the kitchen at certain points. They had a lot of local musicians working there like Bill Carson and Freddie Tavares, and they all had input.

“Leo wasn’t a player and could only trust the advice of those around him. But, he was listening all the time. By September ’54, the Stratocaster had evolved substantially. In my opinion, they were constantly trying to make a more perfect wheel.”

Well, if a 1954 Strat turns up at your local vintage emporium with a big ol’ ding in the body, lots of zeroes and a 1 on the neck plate… At least you know its backstory.

NAMM 2026: Seymour Duncan is taking a leaf out of Fishman’s book with its brand-new MortalCoil humbuckers, which pack three distinctive voices for catch-all tonality.

Sounding like a Tekken character, the MortalCoil Multiple-Voiced Active Humbuckers are loaded with three precision-engineered voices, inspired in part by its heritage pickups.

There’s the fast, controlled attack of its modern metal-minded MC1s in voice one, authentic JB tones in voice two – the pickup it made with Jeff Beck, but one that's taken on a life of its own since – and a clear, articulate single coil to round out the lot.

Beneath the hood, there’s some wiring wizardry going on, too. They’re precision-wound high-density copper coils with optimized resistance, which, in simple terms, means that they offer a faster response and stronger pick attack “than competing designs” – and it's a perk that it says will benefit users of all tunings.

Moreover, the humbuckers also boast new preamps, imbuing them with a more dynamic feel, even when the distortion is dialed back to its minimum. Their efficient circuitry, meanwhile, helps prolong battery life. Pair it with Ernie Ball’s rechargeable 9Vs – what a revelation! – and you could be on to a real winner.

In recent years, Fishman Fluence pickups, bolstered by their multi-voice system, have been appearing in guitars of all shapes and sizes, with widespread backing, including endorsements from Polyphia’s Tim Henson and Scott LePage, as well as Mick Thomson, and a continued presence in Strandberg guitars.

It seems, then, that Seymour Duncan, a company with a rich heritage, is looking to bite back with this three-in-one active pickup. By packing the “surgical precision” of the MC1, the genre-crossing JB, and a single coil sound made with modern rigs in mind – which is especially useful for guitars without a pre-wired split coil – the MortalCoil could prove a worthy adversary.

“Experience what happens when 50 years of pickup expertise meets modern active technology,” says Seymour Duncan. “MortalCoil installs easily as a drop-in upgrade for many existing active setups and includes all required pots and wiring.”

Some eagle-eyed folk have noticed that the MortalCoils play a big role in ESP's latest lineup, including the TH-1000 Evertune. Now they're available as aftermarket parts, ready to add more heat and versatility to six- and seven-string guitars.

The Seymour Duncan MortalCoil Multi-Voiced Active Pickups are available for $169.00 per pickup, or $279.00 for a set.

See Seymour Duncan for more.

It’s been a busy few months for the pickup brand, having released Slash’s Back to the Beginning pickups, which were custom-wound for his SG, earlier this month.

40 years ago, Maryland native Paul Reed Smith took a chance on starting his own guitar company with no idea how things would pan out. It’s a good thing he chose to roll the dice.

He’s since become one of the world’s most respected builders – someone whose creations encapsulate the very notion of a well-crafted and custom-made boutique instrument.

Early on, he’d made guitars for Peter Frampton, Al Di Meola and Carlos Santana, and having witnessed firsthand how well his innovations had been working out for them, he launched PRS Guitars at the 1985 NAMM Show, debuting the newly designed Custom 24.

It’d be fair to say a lot has happened over the four decades since then, with top-shelf musicians like John Mayer, Orianthi and John McLaughlin signing up to become signature artists, as well as the more metallic players from bands like Alter Bridge, Opeth and Periphery.

While it’d be fair to say Smith’s output has taken some degree of influence from the classic formulas pioneered in the ’50s, models like the Custom 24 are notable for having their own kind of identity – from the 25-inch scale length that sits right in between the original Gibson and Fender designs to the custom bird inlays, jaw-dropping flame finishes and highly dependable tremolo system.

With the U.S.-made Core line retailing for several thousands of dollars, there were many years where these guitars were generally regarded as instruments for doctors, dentists and lawyers. That all changed in 2001 with the launch of the overseas-produced SE Santana, which kick-started a whole line of models marrying quality with affordability.

Since then, the line has expanded with various semi-hollow, extended range and piezo options – building up a fierce reputation as the best guitars you can find within their price range. It’s been one hell of a journey, says Smith, whose company now stands as the world’s third best-selling brand.

If you could go back in time and talk to the young man just starting out, what would you say?

“Don’t stop – it’s going to take you longer to mature than you think, but you’ll survive, so don’t worry about it too much!” I had a dream once, and I’ve never told anyone this, but I heard this loud voice and woke up in a cold sweat. The words I heard were, “It’s 10 times more complicated than you ever imagined.”

And that’s been true, from finally getting the pickups right for John Mayer, getting our necks to remain stable and our finishes to not injure the tone. I decided not to be a hermit – like “Nobody gets to talk to Paul!” – and instead, be the kind of person who talks to everybody.

What do you think has helped separate you from every other brand?

Guitars are tools for a job. I remember watching Carlos Santana playing the Oscars, and all I wanted was for the guitars to stay in tune and do what he needed. I just want my guitars to do their job.

I don’t sit there and feel this sense of pride, like, “I made that.” I just hope the performance goes well. You only get one shot when you’re on the Oscars. You break a string? You’re dead. That’s it – sharp bridge saddle? Done. It only takes one thing to go wrong.

How’d you get into building?

There are two kinds of people. One will say, “I’ve got nothing to offer” and people will say, “No kid, you come with me.” Then you’ve got the other kind who keep shouting about what they have, and everybody is like, “You’ve got nothing. Shut up and go home!” I was in group two.

Some of the musicians I’ve worked with are in group one. They’d go to the studio and get told to sit in a chair and not move. Brent Mason is that way. He’d send in demos of himself singing, because he’s a great singer, and they’d ask, “Who is on guitar?”

When they found out it was him, the deal was done. I’d show people my guitars and everybody would say, “No, no, no!” But nice people like Carlos Santana would say, “What have you got?” He didn’t care about what anyone else thought.

You had to make your own luck, to some degree.

Well, I didn’t get invited to make Eric Clapton a guitar at 13. I started my journey because I wanted to play guitar, but like oil and water, it ran away from me. But if I opened a case on the counter of the biggest music shop in Washington, D.C., it would draw a crowd. The world was saying, “This is what you have to offer,” but it still wasn’t “Come with me.”

I was told my whole life that if you make something magical, the world will beat a path to your door. What a load of bullshit. If you make something magical, you might be able to get an appointment for 15 minutes.

Guitar makers come around once every 30 years, and I’ve studied them all. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve put guitars in cases and said, “Go do your job.” I don’t need to be there when the case is opened.

I also realized you can be a nice guy and get no orders, or you could be a difficult human being and the world will give you tons. It’s nothing to do with how you are, it’s to do with the caliber of the art you make. Guitars will sound good and play well regardless of how nice the builder is.

You were a custom builder for high-profile artists before launching your own company.

I made a deal with all of them saying if they didn’t fall in love with the guitar, I’d give them their money back. Carlos would say, “You mean, if I don’t love it, I don’t have to buy it? Under that deal, I’ll take it!” At that time, asking $2,000 for a guitar was outrageous. I think $900 was the ceiling. When we came out with a guitar at $1,000, it was pretty out there.

I remember having a meeting with our reps and all of them telling me we can’t do this. It’s not that I wanted to charge more; it cost more to make because it took more time and the parts cost more money. That’s just the way it was – and is.

Ted McCarty was an early mentor. What do you remember about him?

He wasn’t famous when I met him. He was a forgotten man, and I love that he got put back on the map. The last time I took him to NAMM, I rolled him around in a wheelchair and everybody came out to say goodbye to him, knowing it was the last time. He was cool, a real champion.

He’d fall asleep and then I’d wake him up saying, “Ted, you’ve got an interview,” so he’d do that and go back to sleep. He was kinda like the grandfather I never had. He trusted me. He handed us the baton, like in a relay race.

The SE line felt like a long time coming. It’s incredible how close they can be to your Core models.

That was our goal. At one point, the SEs were going to go away; we were having trouble with sales. And all the guitar teachers in America made their students buy SEs because they couldn’t teach kids how to play guitars that wouldn’t stay in tune. The teachers saved the line and we were back at the races. But it was almost done. That happens a lot in the guitar business.

Your guitars are no longer just for doctors, dentists and lawyers. Did that perception ever bother you?

No. The reason people would say those things is because doctors and dentists would have enough money to buy early Private Stocks and 10 Tops. When the S2 and SEs came out, that was over. Did it bother me? No. What bothered me was that one time I saw a catalog that said, “Best fit and finish in the entire industry” on our page, but on the Gibson page it said, “The sound of rock and roll.” I thought to myself, “Wrong comment on the wrong page!”

Frankly, there’s a new sound we’ve come up with on our TCI guitars that doesn’t sound like a Gibson, Fender, Les Paul, SG, Strat, Tele, Ibanez or anything. It’s a humbucker that sounds like a single coil, and I couldn’t be happier.

There’s a lot of speculation out there about where tone comes from. You’ve always seemed to be on “team wood”.

According to the internet, the only thing that’s important when you play a Stradivari violin is the Neumann microphone hanging over the top of it. People say the same about guitars. I don’t buy it. That means dead strings mean nothing. I mean, really? Put Vaseline all over your strings, pluck it and tell me your guitar sounds the same. I just don’t buy it.

What I do buy is that the pickup is half of it, but it ain’t all of it, no way. For some people, if a guitar has no sustain, they buy a compressor. If it has no after-ring, they buy a reverb pedal. I understand that. I mean, Jimi Hendrix had a Uni-Vibe, a wah-wah, this and that, but I’m sorry, if you listen to the rhythms on The Wind Cries Mary, that’s just him playing a new guitar and amp and he sounds gorgeous.

I don’t buy the simplistic view. You can’t take one of the only pieces I have away from me, saying it makes no difference. Alright then, make a guitar out of balsa wood and rubber, then add your pickup. I just don’t buy it.

What’s the greatest sound you’ve ever heard from a PRS on an album?

Smooth by Santana. I went to Japan when that song was a hit and it was the sound of Tokyo. You walked down the street and every store with speakers outside would be playing that song. I was in a grocery store yesterday and that song is still playing. Out of all the PRS guitars I’ve made, the one used for that song had the most impact.

He got something like 10 Grammys for that song. He walked into my office after that, slammed the door and said, “I swear to God I haven’t changed,” basically telling me the fame hadn’t gone to his head. And he said thank you to every single person in my factory. In the Jewish world, we call him a mensch, the very highest level of human being. He was spectacular that day and has always been.

Who would you love to work with that you haven’t had the chance to yet?

Jimmy Page, except I did make a guitar for him. He used one of our guitars on the Outrider tour, and it was some of the best tremolo work I’d ever heard. I did make a guitar for Eddie Van Halen, but that’s a long story and he’s gone.

People don’t know this, but Jeff Beck had a PRS at home and he loved it. He told me I’d never see him with it but he used it to record. We’ve been trying to get it back; it wasn’t part of the auction this year, but I know he loved that guitar. Of course, he’s not with us anymore either – and the same goes for Stevie Ray Vaughan. I could say Eric Gales, but he’s played our guitars plenty of times.

Joe Bonamassa told me that the first guitar he bought with his lawnmower money as a kid was a PRS McCarty. I like Joe, but I don’t think we are in his destiny right now. There are an awful lot of people playing PRS guitars that you don’t know about, but I do know they do. So I’d have to say David Gilmour.

I’ve met him, he’s a sweetheart and was really nice to me. The way he plays guitar is very written and intentional. American players are more like wild Mustangs – they just go for it. English players look for more beautifully written parts.

Apparently, David spent two weeks on the Comfortably Numb solo. That’s the story. I don’t know if it’s true, I don’t even care if it’s not true, it’s just a good story.

What can we expect from PRS over the next couple of years?

I’d like to see the McCarty IIIs and TCIs accepted. It’s staggering, the amount of artists playing the Silver Sky, which came out of us retooling an old 1963 pickup. I played a Charcoal Phoenix at our 40th-anniversary party. That went well. The new John McLaughlin went well. I’d like to see this stuff establish itself.

You have to remember Les Pauls were out of business until Slash picked one up. Strats were out of business until Hendrix picked one up. Then people like Danny Gatton, Roy Buchanan and Bruce Springsteen brought Teles back.

The guitar market is slow to move. I want some of our new products to get their feet more grounded in the longterm evaluation. I would like to see more acceptance across the board.

• Find out more at PRS Guitars.
• This article first appeared in Guitar World. Subscribe and save.

Best of 2025: Over the holiday season, GW is shining the spotlight on some of its biggest stories of the year.

John McLaughlin has opened up on his guitar-collecting habits, and remembered the time he gifted Jeff Beck a vintage Fender Stratocaster that would end up starring on one of the late guitar great’s seminal records.

“I gave a 1967 white [Fender] Strat to Jeff Beck after a tour we did together in 1974, or ’75,” McLaughlin says in a new MusicRadar interview. “And when we lost Jeff, his wife wrote to me and said, ‘I’m going to sell the guitars. They’re all around me, and they keep reminding me of him.’

The guitar itself was especially cherished by Beck, who not only used it on tour in 1975, but took it into the studio to record the Wired album. It also ended up on the record’s cover art.

Intriguingly, the tale surrounding the Wired Strat is a little hazy. Last year, over 130 of Jeff Beck’s electric guitars, tube amps, and other ‘tools of the trade’ went under the hammer, with the entire collection eventually selling at auction for an astounding $10.7 million.

There were a number of Fender Stratocasters in the mix, and McLaughlin insists he saw the one that he gifted Beck in amongst them.

However, according to Christie’s research team, that particular Wired Strat was stolen in the 1970s and was replaced with another white Stratocaster, which actually did end up in the auction catalog.

However, a video clip from a Jeff Beck documentary filmed at a much later date shows Beck with what he reveals to be the Wired Strat, telling the story of how he was first gifted it by McLaughlin.

Speaking of the gift in the archive clip, Beck once said, “Bless his [McLaughlin’s] heart, he just kept coming up to me on tour with a new acquisition and he'd say, ‘Try this, try that.’ After six weeks of this, he brought in this Stratocaster and I said, ‘Piss off, I don’t want to try any more of your guitars.’

“He said, ‘Do you like it?’ I said, ‘Of course I like it.’ He said, ‘Well, it’s yours.’ It’s one of my prized possessions, right here, this Stratocaster. Ironically, I don’t play it because I don’t want it to get nicked. That was on Wired album.”

Regardless, McLaughlin says he saw the Strat he gifted to Beck during the 1975 tour, when he went to visit the auction lot and attend the sale.

“I went to the sale in London,” he remembers. “They had all these instruments, along with amps, pre-amps, and pedalboards. But there were two white Strats! I don’t know which of them I gave him, but anyway, I saw it there!”

In yet another twist, McLaughlin’s official website seemingly confirms that a 1960s vintage Strat that he had given to Beck had indeed been stolen. Of course, Beck owned plenty of white Strats in his time and there were a fair few in the wider lot, so a simple case of misidentification could be at play here. Still, it all makes for a rather interesting story.

Not only that, these early experiences Beck had with white Stratocasters would come full circle when he ended up working with Fender on a signature model, as well as plenty of Custom Shop examples over the years.

Whatever the case, McLaughlin didn’t end up buying back either of the white Stratocasters he saw – with the vintage Strat purporting to be the Wired replacement selling for a cool $441,000.

“I’m not a collector,” McLaughlin says of his guitar-collecting habits. “I get guitars, but I give them away. “Guitars are like human beings – if you don’t play them, they get sick. They really need to be played.

“Instruments are like a marriage between heaven and hell. They’re made on Earth, but the stuff that comes out of them is made in heaven. They’re wonderful in that way.”

Jeff Beck had some intriguing guitars in his collection over the years, perhaps none more so than the prototype Ibanez signature that resurfaced a few years ago.

Along with having released nearly 30 solo records, Robben Ford has played with everyone from Joni Mitchell to Kiss to Miles Davis. He’s 74, but he’s not done yet – he's just moved to London and is preparing to release another album, Two Shades of Blue, in 2026.

“What keeps me going is that I love to play music,” he tells Guitar World. “I love the whole experience: playing with people whose playing you like, and having an audience out there.”

For his upcoming release the maverick nomad explored territory previously claimed by Jeff Beck. “If I was going to do another album, I didn’t wanna do the same thing,” Ford says. “Deciding on a tribute meant I needed to bring myself to do it justice. It gave me a new lease on guitar playing, in a way. I’ve appreciated this little journey.”

Was Jeff Beck a significant influence on you?

Not in the beginning. Like everyone else I had the Truth album and I loved that – but that’s a long time ago. I was more inspired by Mike Bloomfield, Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix. As the years progressed I got more into jazz, Miles Davis and John Coltrane.

So Jeff wasn’t really on my radar. I saw him play live for the first time in about 2008, and it was the best guitar concert I’ve ever been to. I started listening to him – but not a ton, because his style is so personal to him, and you sound like who you listen to.

I’ve never listened to any players for extended periods of time because it’s a big mistake. That’s how I feel about it. But I got to hear him play a few more times, and I came to think of him as the outstanding living guitar player of our time. Then he passed away, and it lit me up to tribute him in some way; and it was a way for me to go somewhere with the guitar that I hadn’t gone before.

What’s it been like playing a Strat, which you’re not known for?

I played a Strat a little in the ‘80s; I used it when I was in more of a supportive role when I toured with David Sanborn and in the time I spent with Miles Davis. The vibrato was on the guitar, but I was rarely using it – just a bit here and there. I’m more of a straight-ahead kind of player; I went back to the humbucking style of guitar.

So revisiting the Strat has really been a blast! I didn’t own a Strat. I’m living in London now and I had a relationship with Anderton’s, so I went there and found one, a ’66 reissue from the Fender Custom Shop.

How has the Strat altered the way you play?

It’s very specific. I used it on the music that was written for and inspired by Jeff Beck. It has its own function; the vibrato really makes a big difference. The Strat has an entirely different feel from the guitars I normally use.

I’m still learning – the use of harmonics, the use of the vibrato, the use of the sounds. It takes a while to get good at these things. But I’m really pleased with what people are gonna hear.

What amps are you going with?

Always tube amps. The last few years, if I’m not able to take the Dumble with me I’ve been using a Little Walter. I met the guy who makes those, Phil Bradbury, through Vince Gill, because Vince was using them. We had to find the right speaker configuration – Phil’s really into that. So I have what’s called The ’59: a 50-watt head with a 2x12 cabinet. And I also have a 100-watt.

Listeners aren’t always keen on new music from elder artists.

Yeah, I know. We all have to just give up on that and do it for ourselves – and I don’t wanna play somebody else’s music. I wanna play my own. I’ve been writing music since I was 17; and I don’t mean with any great result, necessarily, although over time it does get better. If you wanna play something, you gotta write something.

You could have joined other bands, but you do what speaks to you. Do you know what drives that?

There’s always something about working for other people where I get bored. I would get bored within a matter of weeks – though with Joni Mitchell I was never bored. But that was a long time ago. David Sanborn was fun. But I got bored with Miles Davis; he started tightening up the music, and we stopped playing a lot of the things that were fun to play.

He was like, “Robben, play that shit just like the record,” and we’d be doing more and more of the Tutu record, and less improvisation. It was just playing the parts, and I didn’t join Miles Davis to do that.

I always wanna be playing something for real. I wanna love it and be able to feel that I’m giving it 100%. But working for other people, it’s usually about them, you know? When you really feel it’s about them, you’re just a cog, just punching a time clock.

I’ve always needed to feel like there was room to move and that we were all in it together. So I kinda have to have my own band, and I try to be the bandleader that they deserve.

Why do you think you were never bored with Joni?

She’s just the ultimate creative artist. She was lovely to work for and the musicians around her were all great – especially on the first tour, which resulted in the Miles of Aisles album. It was just a constant joy. She was just one of the guys and behaved that way; that never changed.

She loved working with the people, and we had that feeling where we were all in it together. And of course, her next record was The Hissing of Summer Lawns, which is like frigging Sgt. Pepper’s, you know? It’s just a work of genius.

What gear did you bring into the studio with you for The Hissing of Summer Lawns?

I did In France They Kiss on Main Street, Don’t Interrupt the Sorrow, and Harry’s House/Centerpiece. But it’s hard for me to talk about a rig because I didn’t have one! I was probably playing through a Fender Twin, which is ridiculous in a recording studio because they’re so loud.

Or maybe it was something rented from SIR, which is very possible. I probably had a little pedalboard with a tuner, a phase shifter and a fuzztone. I was not hip in those days! It wasn’t quite as big of a deal in those days, but it became a big deal for sure. It was more about the playing than the pedals – and thank goodness for that because I was not into the pedal thing!

But I’ll tell you one thing that exemplifies what it was like to work with Joni. We used the volume pedal a lot in those days, but she said, “How about you just plug into a fuzztone then plug directly into the console, and we’ll see what that sounds like?”

I was like, “Oh, Joni, that’s gonna be terrible! We need an amp.” She said “Would you just try it?” Begrudgingly, I tried it – and that turned out to be the guitar on In France They Kiss on Main Street. It’s different and cool, and it made me play a different way. Joni was creative, and never in a hurry.

I had a similar experience when she was doing Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter. We were in the studio, and she was doing what she considered “source music” that was going to be in the background of something – like a cinematic happening in the foreground; but it never came to fruition.

We recorded this blues that was like John Lee Hooker, a slow, one-key, funky thing. I was playing acoustic guitar and she goes, “Robben, could you tune down to the key that we’re in, so you have all those open strings?” I was like, “That’s gonna sound terrible, Joni…”

She said “Would you just try it?” I had to tune a regular six-string Martin guitar down to C with just .12s on it. The strings were practically hanging off the guitar, but it was cool! I wish that had been on the record or heard somehow; but once again, working with her was like that. It was really special, man.

People have grown to love Summer Lawns, but critics were harsh at the time. Did you know you had a winner despite that?

I had no idea what critics thought – I never looked! I was just grateful for having been a part of it. I mean, I can tell you, with a light touch, that the tour was not so great; The concerts maybe weren’t received as well that first year.

Was that a reaction to the subject matter of the record?

I think it was. Joni was going through a rough patch emotionally; and that music, a lot of it was pretty dark. People were a little surprised that it wasn’t that lovely, light, bright, and wonderful Joni Mitchell thing. guess I was aware of that; the whole vibe overall was not really great. The ‘70s were a rough period – on the road, people were misbehaving, shall we say, quite a lot!

Where do you go from here?

The new record, Two Shades of Blue, will come out in 2026 through Mascot. And since I’ve been living in London for about two and a half years, I’ve met so many great musicians. The reception I’ve gotten here has been fantastic, and that helps to keep you musically frisky!

So there’s new people to play with who are really good, and it’s just great. London has been really marvellous on the music side for me, though it’s hard to find a guitar tech – I don’t have that dialed in.

• Keep up with Ford’s album, teaching and touring via his website.

Paul Reed Smith has added another name to the list of 'guitarists you didn't know played PRS guitars': Jeff Beck.

Over the course of his storied career, Beck played a number of different electric guitars from a variety of brands.

Not only was he fiercely loyal to a select number of Fender Stratocasters and Telecasters, the late virtuoso also had a number of legendary Gibson Les Pauls – the Oxblood and Yardburst among them – as well as some more oddball picks, such as a prototype Les Paul/Tele Ibanez hybrid signature.

One brand that is seldom (if ever) mentioned in the same breath as Beck, though, is PRS. That Beck would play something plucked from the PRS shelf might come as a surprise to some guitar fans, but that, as it turns out, is exactly what happened.

According to Paul Reed Smith, who features in the new issue of Guitar World, Beck had a PRS guitar that he “loved”, and although he made it clear to Smith that he’d never be seen playing it live, he did find it a valuable guitar for recording and playing at home.

When asked about the guitar icons he wished he could build a guitar for, Smith teased some obscure tidbits from some of the lesser-heard chapters of PRS history – including a surprising fan in the form of Beck.

“Jimmy Page, except I did make a guitar for him,” Smith responds to the question. “He used one of our guitars on the Outrider tour, and it was some of the best tremolo work I’d ever heard. I did make a guitar for Eddie Van Halen, but that’s a long story and he’s gone.

“People don’t know this, but Jeff Beck had a PRS at home and he loved it,” Smith adds. “He told me I’d never see him with it but he used it to record.”

Smith is coy on which exact PRS Beck played. Was it a custom Silver Sky? Beck was a Strat man, after all, so that seems like a potential contender. But on the flip side, Beck was never scared to experiment and try new things, so perhaps a Private Stock McCarty, or a Custom 24, was more to his liking. Who knows?

Whatever the case, the current whereabouts of the guitar are publicly unknown, but Smith goes on to say the company has been attempting to track the instrument down. That task was made harder by the fact that this mystery PRS wasn’t included in the record-breaking Jeff Beck auction event that took place earlier this year.

“We’ve been trying to get it back,” Smith reveals. “It wasn’t part of the auction this year, but I know he loved that guitar.”

Beck’s PRS was just one of many of the brand’s guitars that ended up with a surprising owner. As mentioned above, Smith was also asked to build a guitar for Eddie Van Halen, at the behest of Kramer.

As for whether we’ll ever see Beck’s own PRS, or if the company will ever be able to get its hands on it again, remains to be seen.

Read the full interview with Paul Reed Smith in the new issue of Guitar World, available via Magazines Direct, which features a run down of the Best of Guitar 2025.

Ronnie Wood may have plenty in his bank account today, but the Rolling Stones legend and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer has revealed that he stole his first bass guitar.

Wood rose through the ranks with the Birds, later joining Jeff Beck’s band – where he played bass – before forming the Faces in 1969, and eventually replacing Mick Taylor in the Rolling Stones. He’s been with the group for almost a staggering 50 years.

Before that, he’d risen through the British rhythm and blues scene, but getting his hands on a bass – an instrument he'd been encouraged to learn – wasn’t an easy task.

“I went round to a music store called Sound City and said, ‘If you let me borrow one for tonight, I promise I'll come back?’” he says (via the Mirror). However, the transaction played on his mind as he cut his teeth in his early bands.

“I didn't go back until five or six years later, when I was in The Faces [and] I could pay them,” he confesses. “I told them that I was the person who stole the Fender Jazz bass, and I'd come back to pay them. They just smiled and said: ‘We thought it was you!’”

The Faces, who produced seminal blues tracks like Stay With Me, are expected to release their first album since 1973's Ooh La La next year. Drummer Kenny Jones revealed that he had reunited with Wood and vocalist Rod Stewart and recorded 11 new songs.

Meanwhile, Wood is set to release a new career-spanning anthology, Fearless, and in its liner notes, he’s reflected on his formative years as a blues guitarist in 1960s London. One of his earliest highlights came when his band, the Birds, found themselves on the same bill as blues legend Bo Diddley.

“What made him so great was his freedom, his reckless abandon, and the confidence that shone through in his music,” he says. “He could break and change a guitar string onstage without stopping the song.”

By 1976, Wood had become an official member of the Rolling Stones, but Harvey Mandel – who had also auditioned for the gig – recently came out firing, believing he was a far better fit for the job.

Though Pino Palladino’s resume is staggering, his approach to work is quite simple: “I just turn up with a couple of basses, to be quite honest,” he tells Bass Player. Of course, it’s not that simple.

Through the ’80s and ’90s his beloved fretless StringRay appeared on records by Paul Young, David Gilmour, Pete Townshend, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Don Henley, Phil Collins, Tears For Fears, Go West and Joan Armatrading, among others. That iconic instrument has now been commemorated by Ernie Ball Music Man with a new signature model.

After 50 years in the game, his fretted and fretless playing still reaches the top of the charts.

“Miley Cyrus, Ed Sheeran, Beyoncé, Harry Styles – they’re all great artists,” he says. “Their songs sound great before I even get to them. The question is, ‘How do I fit in but also add something?’ That process has never changed.”

Few bassists have a catalog as extensive as yours. What do you think when you look back?

I wasn’t particularly ambitious when I started playing. It wasn’t like, as a teenager, I thought I’d be a session musician. I just wanted to play guitar or bass in a band.

Did you choose the bass or did it choose you?

It chose me, definitely. I was really into sports in my early teens, but a short time after I started playing guitar, I could hear chords and recognize them, even if I didn’t have a guitar. I didn’t realize that was unusual!

How did you get your start in session work?

It just happened. I saw a couple of concerts with backing musicians playing behind solo artists, and I thought, “They sound really good, but they’re not a band as such. I wonder who they are?”

Early on in your session career, you began using a Music Man StingRay fretless bass. What led to that?

I grew up in Cardiff, Wales, and I’d had a Kramer fretless for a little while. I often try to remember what the hell I did with it! I must have sold it or traded it. But I’d I never really gravitated toward it – I’d just wanted to try it out.

But then in 1981, when I was in New York on tour, I went into a Sam Ash on 48th Street and saw this StingRay fretless bass, and it just looked cool. I bought it and I played it at the show that night. It was a big turning point for me – I started to find my own sound.

Another key piece of your early rig was the Boss Octave pedal. What led you to that?

I was working on a session and I came up with a bassline, then I had the idea to double the line an octave higher. I liked it, so I bought a Boss OC-2 to get that sound live.

At what point did you begin to feel you’d created a sound on bass that people wanted on their records?

That was in the ’80s. The first chance I got to play my Music Man on a record was Gary Numan’s I, Assassin. Gary was very encouraging and gave me license to express myself.

Then Laurie Latham and Ian Kewley, who were working for Paul Young, called me to play on his No Parlez record. I went did five records and numerous tours with Paul through the ’80s. That’s when people heard me playing the fretless. I got a lot of calls after that!

One of those records was David Gilmour’s About Face in 1984.

I’d played on a song for Paul called Wherever I Lay My Hat (That’s My Home). We did an arrangement that was pretty different from Marvin Gaye’s original; we slowed it down, and Paul really made the song his own – he really killed it.

They had left space for a bass intro and suggested I should come up with a fretless melody to introduce the vocal. David Gilmour heard that song; he’d seen me playing live with Paul around 1983, so he invited me to play on his record.

That was like a dream for me! I was a huge Pink Floyd fan, and even more a David Gilmour fan! His guitar playing is so melodic and soulful. He told me who was playing on the record – “We’ve got Jeff Porcaro on drums, Steve Winwood on keyboards” – and I’m freaking out. It was one of those huge moments for me.

In 1985 you played on Pete Townshend’s White City: A Novel.

That’s connected, too – David did a song on his record called Love On The Air that he’d written with Pete. Pete heard that, and so I was recommended for White City. That was the start of my relationship with Pete.

Was the chemistry between you and Pete immediate?

It was actually the second song where we really kicked off. The first song was White City Fighting, and there was a bass feature in there. It all went well, and Pete was very positive. He asked Chris Thomas, the producer: “You know that song we cut the other day? Why doesn’t Pino try playing on that as well?”

He left the room while Chris played me Give Blood, which David Gilmour had played on, along with Simon Phillips on drums. It sounded so amazing, but there was no bass on it. It was like, “Hello – it’s my lucky day!”

I came up with an idea using the octaver. Pete came back while I was doing it and he really liked it. I think Give Blood really opened up the thing with Pete.

In 1989 you played on Eric Clapton’s comeback hit, Bad Love.

That came about through Phil Collins. I’d already worked with Phil, who was doing that song with Eric, and I got the call. I remember hearing the intro and coming up with a fretless line. Once we cut the track live I went into the control room and fleshed out my intro idea.

In the ’90s you transitioned from the fretless StingRay to a traditional fretted. What led to that?

From the early ’80s through 1995, that fretless was pretty much the only instrument I used. That’s a lot of fretless over a long time! Then I had a short-scale Fender Mustang bass, and I started playing that. In the ’70s I listened to a lot of R&B, funk and Motown; and in the ’90s, I just wanted to get back to that stuff.

Is that when the Fender P-Bass came into play?

In 1974 my father had bought me my first-ever bass, a 1974 Fender Precision. Round about 1992 I got myself a ’60s Fender Precision and put some flatwound strings on it.

My great friend Steve Jordan and I were always talking about the sound of those incredible records from back in the day. That’s what inspired me to put flats on my Precision Bass. As soon as I put them on I was like, “There’s the sound!”

I felt like that was the sound I wanted to hear again. It certainly wasn’t popular; in fact, that sound had been considered pretty old-fashioned through the ’70s and ’80s. In 1997 I was asked to play on an album of duets for B.B. King, Deuces Wild.

That’s how I met D’Angelo, which led to me to recording and touring with him, then using my P-Bass at Electric Lady Studios with the Soulquarians. We recorded for Erykah Badu, Common, Bilal, De La Soul, Talib Kweli and Roy Hargrove, amongst others.

In 1999 you featured on Jeff Beck’s Who Else! record.

I’d actually toured with Jeff back in 1993. He was just so special – for me he’s the greatest. I’d been a fan since The Jeff Beck Group days; then later on the Blow by Blow album blew my mind. I also toured with him in 2006 and we did a live record with Vinnie Colaiuta and Jason Rebello, Official Bootleg USA ’06. That was such great band.

Jeff liked the way the fretless bass sounded and I learned so much from playing unison lines with him – the way he’d bend notes and use vibrato. He’d sometimes pick up my fretless and just play the craziest licks. I was in awe! “Jeff, please show me that lick you just played!”

Your work with John Mayer beginning with 2005’s Try! is also noteworthy. How did you hook up with him?

That came through Steve Jordan. I got the call to go and play with John and Steve in New York, and after rehearsing a song for the tsunami relief TV show, we started jamming on other stuff.

There was obvious chemistry there; John’s playing and his love for that music really shone through. It was just the perfect meeting at the perfect time for us. He actually booked a tour for us as The John Mayer Trio, even though we didn’t have many songs to play!

What were your observations of John as a player and bandmate?

He’s a very natural musician – he’s got such a great ear for melody, harmony and arrangement. Just listen to Neon, an amazing guitar piece. He plays that live on an acoustic, with the bassline and the chords at the same time, along with some topline stuff. And he’s singing too!

You’ve been playing with The Who since John Entwistle’s death in 2002. Pete has often said your arrival opened new avenues of inspiration for him.

I guess Pete knew what he was getting with me, but there was no way I could have played in the same style that John did; he was unique. Luckily for me, Pete encouraged me to be myself.

There are obviously some iconic, brilliant and memorable basslines that John played. His lines are often integral parts of the songs and they need to be played like he did. I always tried to pay homage to the music of the band – in the end it’s all about the music.

Did you have to alter your approach much to fit in with The Who?

Not really, apart from hitting the strings harder, and digging in more to cut through that huge band sound. I just tried to follow Pete but be ready to react with the group’s dynamics.

What are your typical recording and touring rigs like these days?

For recording it’s pretty much just turning up with a couple of basses. Sometimes I’ll take a pedalboard with a Khan DI. At most studios there’s an Ampeg B-15 amp, and I have a Pure Tone valve amp and an Eich combo. But I’m okay with whatever they have at the session. Most engineers will take a DI as well as an amp sound and match them up.

For playing live we all have in-ears now, so there’s no big rigs on stage. Last time I toured with John Mayer I had a B-15. I don’t even know if the speaker was plugged in – it was a B-15 head driving the bass sound and the DI into the in-ears.

What’s next for you?

I recently released That Wasn’t a Dream, my second album with Blake Mills. We had a lot of fun making it. Blake is an incredibly gifted musician and producer. I’m really looking forward to touring to support it with Blake, Chris Dave and Sam Gendel.

I’ve also worked with Ernie Ball on the signature version of my ’79 fretless Music Man StingRay bass that’s just come out. I enjoyed working with the team at Ernie Ball; we really got into the fine details of what makes my bass unique, and built all those details into the signature model.

• For more information on the Pino Palladino StingRay, head to Ernie Ball Music Man.

Ritchie Blackmore has lifted the lid on his relationship with the late Jeff Beck and discussed how the guitarist regularly downplayed his talents.

Beck, who had offers to join both the Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd during his career, is considered as one of the world’s greatest – and distinctive – guitarists, but he often didn't see it like that.

Blackmore and Beck first crossed paths in the mid-’60s during their session player days. They both played on a track produced by Jimmy Page, who, after his brief stint in the Yardbirds, would find fame with Led Zeppelin.

“I couldn't believe how incredible he was,” Blackmore recalled of that session following Beck’s passing in January 2023. “He could reach up into the stars and make magic with his playing. His choice of notes was always absolutely perfect.”

Now, in a fresh interview with Rock Of Nations With Dave Kinchen And Shane McEachern, the Deep Purple legend has spoken more about the late guitar great and his struggles with imposter syndrome.

“ Jeff was a great guitar player. That was a big blow, him going,” he says. “He had a very special way of playing. It was so different from anybody. I always used to go and see him play, because I found him very refreshing.”

But despite Blackmore and the rest of the world drooling over his tradition-skewing chops, it seems he didn’t always feel the same about his craft.

“He would always put himself down,” Blackmore continues. “I'd say, ‘How is your latest record, Jeff?’ And he'd go, ‘Oh, it's a lot of rubbish.’ He would always say that about anything he put out. He was always reaching for something he couldn't find.”

The story harmonizes with Mick Rogers' claim that he owns the last recording that Beck ever made, but added that it's unlikely to see the light of day because Beck didn't like his guitar tone and had planned to re-record it.

Joe Satriani has also spoken about nearly getting Jeff Beck on a G3 tour, but he pulled out late on. Satch says he's one of the few bucket list players to have turned the gig down.

After the record-breaking sale of Beck's guitar collection, one of his most iconic guitars has gone on to pass through the hands of contemporary players to keep his legacy alive. His infamous Yardburst Les Paul, which was given a Custom Shop reissue last year, has been gigged with by Marcus King and Lenny Kravitz's foil, Crag Ross, since its $490,000 sale.

Meanwhile, Blackmore is back on the road again after his wife and musical partner issued some updates concerning his health back in April.

Not many guitar players can say they were personally recruited by Jeff Beck to join his band for a world tour. But, in the case of Nicolas Meier, the invitation is hardly surprising as this Swiss-born, UK-based musician has such a unique talent and sound.

This year Nicolas is releasing Last Sunset, a collection of songs inspired by his experiences and memories working alongside the much-missed guitar hero.

On tracks such as Plan 9, Strange Sensations and Bosphorus, it’s easy to gauge what a profound effect Beck had on him, with the tracks also mixing together elements of instrumental rock, jazz and world music into one breathtaking package.

Freeway Jam

It was by pure chance that Nicolas joined Beck’s band. Nicolas was performing at Ronnie Scott’s in London and the jazz-rock pioneer happened to be in attendance.

“We met after the show and I could see he was interested in my influences,” says Nicolas. “I was using nylon strings and fretless. He liked the music because it was a different approach to harmony.

“The more I got to know him, the more I could tell he was interested in [different] sounds, from Indian classical to Middle Eastern. That’s what made him Jeff Beck. He would learn things then do it his way.”

Blow By Blow

The opportunity to play some of Beck’s most impactful instrumental guitar pieces is something Nicolas has never taken for granted.

“I loved playing The Pump. It has this lovely groove underneath Jeff’s wonderful touch. My favourite track to play was Where Were You, because of Jeff’s harmonics and the sound he created with the whammy bar.

“I would play the chords underneath on a synth guitar, which was a challenge because a lot can go wrong. It took a lot of concentration. Another favourite was the Charles Mingus cover Goodbye Pork Pie Hat, which would lead into Brush With The Blues. It’s hard to pick because Jeff had 60 years of great music!”

International Influences

There are many standout guitar moments on Last Sunset, but Nicolas points to Yemin as one that holds great importance for his life and career.

“Jeff saw me perform that track, which led to him becoming interested in [my playing],” says the guitarist. “It was written in Turkey, so it has that influence mixed with fusion and rock. The melody is strong and there’s a crescendo before the chorus.

“Then it calms down and there’s space for improvisation in G. It’s not minor or major, you can do whatever you like with it, from Western or Indian or just stick to the blues.”

Over The Rainbow

As its name would suggest, the final track on the album, The Eye Of Horus, has a North African twist.

“I was thinking of Egypt and being around the pyramids,” says Meier. “It needed a rock riff and then some of the melodies go towards that part of the world, before getting into more crazy fusion. Jeff and I worked on that track together.

“I remember we were on the top floor of his house playing really loud while his wife Sandra was dancing. We even ended up playing it live a few times.”

Guitar Shop

“For the acoustic parts, I used my Godin nylon-string and 12-string to make a nice carpet,” reveals Nicolas.

“I also used a Godin synth guitar. The leads were done on my 2014 Ernie Ball Music Man John Petrucci signature. I usually run two Fender Bassbreaker amps for a stereo sound. People seem to enjoy the extra dimension to the chorus and delay with that kind of rig.

“My main overdrive is the Analog Man King Of Tone and I used the Electro-Harmonix Pitch Fork on Plan 9 and their Attack Decay tape reverse simulator on Bosphorus.”

Wired: Nicolas Meier on the other guitarists who inspired his sound

“Getting into Al Di Meola, John McLaughlin and Paco de Lucía was a big moment for me. I loved hearing Al’s tango compositions combined with his incredible picking. Paco was using flamenco harmony but improvising like a jazz guy.

“John had this trio with Trilok Gurtu and Jeff Berlin who knew how to explore the line between jazz and rock, using Indian-style harmony. Around then, I met my wife who is Turkish and started listening to fretless players like Cenk Erdoğan and Erkan Oğur.”

• Last Sunset is out now via MGP
• This article first appeared in Guitarist. Subscribe and save.

Jeff Beck and pop music pioneer Imogen Heap worked together on a number of successful collaborations. Not only did they share the stage and studio together, Heap joined Beck for a track on his Live at Ronnie Scott's album – a performance that has racked up 5.6 million views on YouTube.

It was a fairly comical start to the pair's working relationship, though: when they first met, Heap had no idea who Beck was – even after he gave her an impromptu guitar lesson.

The meeting in question took place from 1997, 10 years before that classic show at Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club in Soho, London. Heap was still a teenager at the time, and the aspiring musician had attended a songwriting camp at Police manager Miles Copeland’s castle in the Dordogne, Southwest France.

“I was much younger than everybody else and socially awkward so I got pretty drunk,” she recalls of camp in a Q&A with The Guardian readers. The extent to which she relied on Dutch courage to get through the event was typified by her actions after the sun had gone down.

“Later that night I ended up drunkenly driving a golf caddy around the estate and crashing into Miles’s mum’s prized terracotta pots,” she laughs. But before that, a private playing session was interrupted.

“I was sitting outside playing guitar very badly to myself and [who turned out to be] Jeff said: ‘Let me show you some shapes.’ I said: ‘Wow, you’re good!’”

Beyond being impressed by his knowledge, she didn’t think much of it.

“A week later, I got a message from my manager asking: ‘Did you meet Jeff Beck?’” she says. “He told me he was this really famous, legendary guitarist – I had no idea! – [and he] wanted me to sing on his record.”

Her contributions to two tracks on Beck’s album, You Had It Coming, were released in 2000. That came two years after her debut album, I Megaphone, which she'd started writing aged 15, was released by Almo Sounds.

Though the record struggled commercially, largely due to the label doing little to promote it – it had shut down before Heap had a chance to ready a follow-up – Beck's backing of her talents went far. She released her second album, Speak For Yourself, in 2005, a year after touring with Beck.

Her unique approach to vocal harmonies and production, particularly on the haunting A Capella Hide and Seek, has since gone on to influence Sleep Token, with Fall For Me the most obvious reference point.

“I sang his gorgeous Nadia [a cover of Nitin Sawhney's 1999 track] as best I could,” Heap says on her collaboration with the Strat-wielding guitar maverick.

“He was a sweet man and I loved him so much. A lot of people from that generation are just so grateful to have been able to do what they loved all those years, and their egos are very small in comparison to the amount of fame they had.”

Jeff Beck’s widow, Sandra, made the difficult decision to auction off his gear last year, so his guitars could enjoy new lives in the hands of players who would adore them. The auction, which raised $10.7 million, was headlined by the record-breaking $1,315,708 sale of his Oxblood Les Paul.

Meanwhile, his Yardburst Les Paul was bought by a vintage guitar store in Paris, and has since been loaned out to Lenny Kravitz's foil, Craig Ross, to keep its spirit burning. It's the same store that has been putting Steve Jones' Sex Pistols Les Paul into the hands of punk and rock legends.

Jeff Beck's guitars are finding a new home in the hands of some of the best players out on tour at the moment.

Marcus King recently wielded the ‘YardBurst,’ alongside KALEO's JJ Julius Son at Colorado's Red Rocks Amphitheatre – while Lenny Kravitz's longtime guitarist, Craig Ross, took it for a spin after it fetched $496,484 (£403,200) at auction earlier this year.

Warren Haynes is the latest in a line of guitarists breathing new life into the ‘Yardburst,’ as seen in several social media videos of him jamming alongside Derek Trucks. According to the official Gov’t Mule Instagram account, it all took place while the band was recently on tour in Chicago.

“We had the chance to meet the team behind @timeless.gem + @family_guitars. One thing led to another, and a jam session turned into @thewarrenhaynes sporting some of rock and roll’s most iconic guitars on stage during our Northerly Island play on Sept 9 – including the Jeff Beck “Yardburst” and Doug Irwin #24.”

The caption continues, “We had such a great time exploring @timeless.gem’s collection and having them at our show, that we’ve decided to link up again for our NYE run in New York at the end of this year. Their team will be generously lending a few guitars (hand selected by Warren himself!) for our end of year run culminating with our 1971: The Year Music Changed The World show.”

Jeff Beck's famed 1959 ‘Yardburst’ Gibson Les Paul Standard was one of the many tools of his trade sold at auction in January. The sale generated $10,746,430 (£8,727,284) – over eight times the pre-sale estimates.

Leading the sale was Jeff Beck's 1954 ‘Oxblood’ Gibson Les Paul, which went under the hammer for around $1,315,708 (£1,068,500) – breaking the world auction record for the most expensive Gibson Les Paul ever sold.

We don’t always get a lot of time to evaluate an instrument for our review pages. There are deadlines to be met, photography to be done, maybe a video to create, before we’re on to the next one.

Quite often there are minor issues with the instrument, the sort of thing us modders can easily fix but can’t always address during a review. Even simple things such as a different string brand and gauge can noticeably change our engagement with the guitar, not to mention a tweak to pickup heights or a slight setup adjustment. While the guitar itself doesn’t change, what we feel about it after some minor modding certainly can.

Case in point is the recent launch of the Epiphone Jeff Beck Oxblood 1954 Les Paul, which I initially reviewed for Guitar World and then wrote an extended feature on for Guitarist.

In order to get to know the Oxblood, there were quite a lot of playtime hours involved, along with reference-listening with other Les Pauls, and a couple of band rehearsals.

Wedged between those two reviews, our editor-in-chief, Jamie Dickson, and our long-time guitar hotshot Richard Barrett put the Oxblood through its paces in a video appraisal for the Guitarist YouTube channel.

In other words, our single sample has been through a few very experienced hands. Not everyone will agree with what we collectively had to say, but at least we put in the hours.

After getting the guitar shipped back from Jamie and Richard, I swear it was playing and sounding better than when it had left me.

New guitars need playing to settle them in and to make everything work together in the same direction, if you like. If we could bottle and simulate the effects of what Richard’s tasty, bendy licks have on the feel of the frets and fingerboard, then we’d have a best-selling product on our hands!

The fret tops honestly feel smoother, the neck back even more glossed. But before a necessary string change, I wondered if I could make it better still? Let’s take a look.

Details Matter

One particular off-spec aspect of our Epiphone Oxblood (and some others we’ve seen in the wild), is that, as reported, the tuners are Grover Rotomatics, not Schaller M6 series like the original, albeit with those more Schaller-like buttons. An obvious mod, then, would be to fit some Schallers!

Today, you can buy direct from Schaller in Germany. A set of M6 90s – which have the rear screw on a lug directly under housing and not angled to the side – look like the best fit. Schaller offers a choice of post heights: the closest, from the back of the headstock to the hole in the string post, are Schaller’s 21.7mm height.

With basic DHL shipping Schaller quoted me €109. Do you need to change tuners? If you want to get as close to Jeff’s guitar as possible, why not? But with such good tuning stability as we’d reported, it wouldn’t be a necessity for any functional reason.

The Graph Tech nut is nicely cut. I did just lightly file a couple of slots to improve tuning during my review time and, again, functionally there was nothing wrong, although reshaping the nut (which can be done in situ) to look a little more like a Gibson from the ’50s, and lose a couple of sharp edges, is too tempting not to do.

As we reported, although the fretting (a medium and not over-high gauge) is pretty good, the actual fret ends haven’t been rounded and feel a little sharp to the touch. It really doesn’t affect the playing experience, although it’s the sort of minor niggle that, frankly, people like me notice.

Likewise, although you wouldn’t expect a bound-fingerboard edge on an old Gibson to have heavily rolled or over-worn edges, I’d be tempted just to round the top edge of the binding here in order to feel more like my old ’50s (unbound) Les Paul Junior.

That ‘no sharp edges’ mantra continues to the pickguard. Its edges are square to the face, not angled, but the top edge is left a little sharp – something that’s easily fixed. While they look great, those speed knobs also have quite sharp top edges and feel a little cheap. Again, easy to fix.

The rather archaic knob pointers aren’t over-sharp and, although I certainly don’t use them to gauge the control positions, they don’t bother me. If they bother you, then they can be easily removed, and actually the pots (and therefore the knobs) could sit lower to the guitar’s face.

Bridge Concerns

The final bit of real estate is of course the Oxblood’s pre-tune-o-matic wrapover bridge/tailpiece. For some, this seems like a real throwback design from the early ’50s, which, of course, it is, and some seven decades later is surely obsolete.

As Jamie and Richard observed in their video, it does alter the appearance compared with the tune-o-matic and stud tailpiece setup. It’s very comfortable to palm-mute with, too, and really pretty much bang on in tune. There’s a very slight ‘sitar-y’ effect on the high E, but in the heat of battle, not least if you’re playing some gutsy rock ’n’ roll like Jeff did on the original, I don’t think either is an issue.

That said, there are plenty of potential upgrades out there from the likes of Faber, Music City, Pigtail and plenty of designs with pre-set intonation ridges or fully adjustable saddles. A future upgrade then, but, like the tuners, not essential.

Typically on an ‘import’ guitar such as this you’d expect to add a new wiring loom, perhaps with vintage-style capacitors, to your upgrade list, but while there’s nothing stopping you from doing that, again, I’m going to live with the guitar a little more. The CTS pot tapers feel good and the vintage-wiring, with Mallory caps, really does open up the sound potential.

Finally…

One thing you might like to try is setting the pickups a little like Jeff did – at least according to the final pictures of the Oxblood before its Christie’s sale. You can clearly see the screw poles are screwed out from the bobbin on the bridge pickup, the high E, B and D being the tallest; the G is screwed down a little from those.

The A string pole is flat to the bobbin top and the low E very slightly, if anything, raised. And, overall, the pickup is screwed down a little more into the body on the treble side, which would, in theory, give a little more single coil-y attack, not least that the pickup is closely placed next to the bridge anyway. That’s easy to do. If you don’t like it, then it’s completely reversible.

It may be a raft of subtle tweaks and a little bit of fettling, but, as ever, what really is a rather good Les Paul, with its relatively light weight and that big neck, now feels finished. It’s a very tempting proposition.

• This article first appeared in Guitarist. Subscribe and save.

Ricky Byrd has a new album out, NYC Made, and the session ace and former Blackheart is feeling pretty good about all things guitar right now. Yes, he admits, he should practice more – he should have learned to read music, too.

But in this quickfire interview with Guitar World, reflecting on the first songs he learned, first electric guitar, and the one he would save if the house went on fire, he says he has done all right. And it’s hard to argue with that.

Not to say there hasn’t been some drama along the way – we’ll let him tell you about that hectic night supporting the Scorpions…

What was your first guitar?

“I was around nine when I saw the Rolling Stones and the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show. I was instantly attracted to George Harrison and Keith Richards’ guitar playing, so I asked my mom if I could get a guitar. She was working at a handbag company, and her boss gave her a gift – for me – on my birthday, a no-name acoustic.

“That little acoustic was how I first learned to play guitar. The second guitar I got, which was my first electric, didn’t even have a name, but it was from a store called Lafayette Electronics. It looked like a Gibson ES-335, but it was cheap and came with a little amp.”

What was the first song you learned to play?

“The Turtles’ Happy Together, because it had a riff I could learn. I wound up doing a show-and-tell at my public school in the Bronx where I grew up, and I played Happy Together. I noticed the girls were all smiling at me, and being 10, I was like, ‘Well, now – that is interesting!’”

What was your first gig?

“I was in a band called Ruff Stuff, and we started playing in our local neighborhood place that was like a coffee, wine and cheese place. It had a stage in the front, and the gig was for a dance. We played all kinds of British stuff. I don’t think we even got paid.”

Ever had an embarrassing moment on stage?

“There was this one time when I was with Joan Jett. We were opening for the Scorpions at an indoor stadium in Spain, and the crowd got a little rowdy. Something went down as somebody had stolen some equipment from the opening act that played before us.

“Somehow we got blamed for it, so the crowd went crazy and somebody threw a 9-volt battery, and it hit me right above my eye. We stopped the show, and Joan and I just stood in the shadows. I remember me and her looking at each other going, ‘I’m not going back out there.’”

What’s your favorite piece of gear?

“I was a Marshall guy back then with Joan. Now I literally cannot listen to Marshalls. I use a lot of small old Fender amps.

“That all came about after I went to see Jeff Beck play at the Iridium in New York, Les Paul’s old club. Jeff was using two small Fender Pro Junior amps – 15 watts, two knobs – Volume and Tone and that’s it. So I went on eBay and found one. I just mic it up and it’s loud as shit. And I can carry it with two fingers.”

The building is burning down. Which guitar from your collection would you save?

“It’d have to be two guitars, because how could I choose? It would be my ’75 blue sparkle Les Paul Deluxe that I used on the I Hate Myself for Loving You tour I did with Joan Jett – and my ’69 Gibson Hummingbird.”

When was the last time you practiced, and what did you play?

“I have an ’87 Martin HD-28 in my den. I always pick it up and play it, and that’s what I was doing last night. But I don’t call it practice; I just sit there and play blues or anything like that. I also kind of just sit down with the guitar and play stuff that might be something that could turn into a song.

“I really don’t sit down and practice scales; I’ve never been that kind of guy. But I’ll put on an Albert King record and play along with it.”

What aspect of the guitar would you like to be better at?

“Probably practicing, because I’m just lazy with that. But I play how I play. I’ve been playing for 50 years, and though I’m pretty good, I could be better. The blues player, Walter Trout, he played in New York a while ago and I went and jammed on a song with him. But I realized I came up cold.

“I was thinking about what I was going to play next as opposed to just shutting my eyes and playing. And that’s what comes with practicing. It becomes just a natural response. You hear the next beat coming, you know what to play, what not to play.”

What guitar-centric advice would you give your younger self?

“I never learned to read music, so maybe I should’ve learned how to read. I do these big events where there might be charts – but I can’t read the charts! So I write it down and learn the songs on my laptop. I sit in my den and just learn the songs.

“And if I feel it’s something I’ll get confused about, I’ll write a chord chart, a cheat sheet. Over my career, I don’t think I have done too badly. I’ve done well with the ability to not be able to read music, though it could have helped in certain situations.”

• NYC Made is out now via Wicked Cool.
• This article first appeared in Guitar World. Subscribe and save.

Typically found shirtless on stage left in leather trousers with a Les Paul hanging under his waist, Enslaved guitarist Arve Isdal could very well be the Norwegian answer to Slash.

And much like the cat in the hat, he’s a musician in high demand, having collaborated on all kinds of releases over the years thanks to the bluesy charm at the epicenter of his barbwire riffing and tasteful shredding.

The Bergen native has recorded 10 albums with progressive metal titans Enslaved, and another seven with hard rockers Audrey Horne (yes, named after the Twin Peaks character), in the process tallying up six Spellemannprisen awards – which anyone in Norway will tell you is their equivalent to a Grammy.

We meet at legendary Bergen concert hall Grieghallen. It’s home to the city’s Philharmonic Orchestra, and for one weekend every year, the Beyond The Gates Festival, when its quaint surroundings are invaded by heavy metal worshippers from around the world.

Next, we stroll to Earshot Studio, which the guitarist co-runs with one-time Enslaved keyboardist Herbrand Larsen. As well as recording their own bands here, the creative hub is also where they’ve worked with Immortal, Gorgoroth, Taake and more.

It’s an Aladdin’s cave of gear, packed with Peavey, Vox and Marshall amps, stacks of pedals and racks of guitars. Naturally there are some mid-’90s Les Paul Customs in the building – the guitar of choice for the man affectionately nicknamed Ice Dale.

“I remember having to decide between a Custom and an Ibanez seven-string,” he says. “I’ve always felt like more of a rock ’n’ roll guy, so it made sense to go with Gibson. I love Slash, Page, Wylde and Rhoads, who are all Les Paul players. Ace Frehley got me started on the whole guitar thing.

“I’ve never regretted it. That 1994 Custom was my main guitar for 20 years. But it got fucked up – I don’t dare take it out anymore, which is sad. My main Custom now is from 1996, fitted with Seymour Duncan Alnico II Pros, like what Slash uses.”

Some of the instruments here are not what you’d expect to find, including some Rivolta offsets and Fender Custom Shop showpieces. The Rivolta connection was made when Isdal was on the hunt for an affordable baritone.

“I looked at reviews of their higher-end models, which are still not that expensive at around $1,000,” he says, handing over one of his Mondata Classicos in Cats Eye Burst for closer inspection. “I got one, then another. They play well and sound different to Gibsons. They’re a great company; I’ll probably end up buying more.”

Those Fender Custom Shop guitars are pretty different to what you use live.

“I’ve got three: one Tele and two Strats, including a Dual-Mag II Journeyman Relic from 2020. People say you start buying more Strats as you get older – I guess that’s true. My first Fender was a Mexican Strat I bought in the States. I started writing on that, which made me want to upgrade.

“I tried a Standard in a shop and then got told to check out the custom ones. I never thought I’d spend $5000 on a guitar – but I tried one and went, ‘Oh fuck!’ It’s funny how you play different on certain instruments. What comes out on a Strat is different to a Les Paul. That’s interesting to me.”

What’s your touring rig at the moment?

“I’ve stuck with the Peavey 6505+ for a while. I like how they sound and the versatility when you turn the gain down. Ivar Bjørnson from Enslaved also has one. We used Kempers for a while, but now we use the Quad Cortex. Thomas Tofthagen, who plays guitar with me in Audrey Horne, has always used Marshalls. We figured a blend would work better than two Marshalls with Les Pauls.

“In that band my set-up is simple: a tuner, a delay and the Xotic EP Booster for solos. I used to run a Tube Screamer but for some reason it didn’t boost enough on a Peavey, even though it did with Marshalls.”

Not many people know you played with Paul Di'Anno. What was it like playing those Iron Maiden classics with the original frontman?

“It was a fun experience. Before I joined Enslaved, there was a festival that was similar to what we have now with Beyond The Gates. For the second year they booked Paul and told me I was playing for him! He had bands in different countries to make touring affordable.

“The show was packed – and it was the first time I played with leather pants and no shirt! Paul said we were the best band he’d ever had and booked us for a tour. Later on, we recorded a DVD in Poland [The Beast In The East].”

How did it all end?

“He booked another tour, but it felt like he was on his way down. He was a nice guy but pretty crazy. He started talking shit about Iron Maiden while playing their songs, which made us feel uncomfortable.

“But we had a great time playing Running Free and Wrathchild. That’s how I met Enslaved – they saw me after kicking out their old guitarist, and asked if I could help until they found a replacement.”

You played on the last Immortal album, which you also produced. You’ve played in Gorgoroth, Abbath and God Seed. It seems like you’re the go-to guitar hero in Norway.

“Maybe! At least in the Bergen scene, which has always been collaborative. People help each other out, playing in different bands. As well as Enslaved, Ivar had been in Borknagar and even did stuff with Satyricon.”

You formed a supergroup called Temple of the Black Moon with Dani Filth, Rob Caggiano and John Tempesta. What happened?

“We released a demo ages ago, but that’s about it. King Ov Hell started the band and Joey Jordison was involved early on. Eventually Dani came in, because Rob had worked with him. They came to Bergen and we hung out.

“Then Tempesta recorded drums for the album in LA. When we got a management and record deal, it got complicated. There were contracts about obligations, making it a priority, but I couldn’t leave Enslaved. It became a problem for Rob when he joined Volbeat. We were about to record guitars, then it all fell apart.”

Ground has one of your most classic Enslaved solos. It almost sounds like Gary Moore in places.

“I like my solos to have a good starting point and blend well into the next part. I’m not a shredder looking to show every skill in 20 seconds. With Ground, I played through a few times and then edited something together.

“I sent it back and everyone said, ‘Fuck yeah!’ Some leads can be more difficult. I don’t think anyone has mentioned Gary Moore before – people usually say it reminds them of David Gilmour. I love both.”

The Fusion of Sense and Earth solo, on the other hand, is pretty intense.

“It’s flashy, but it fits the song’s aggression. I wanted to bring energy. There’s always some melody in my solos, even when they’re fast. That track is atmospheric and dark, so I went for a harmonic minor feel.”

Which solo are you most of proud, then?

“I really like Neogenesis from the Isa album. That one presented more of a challenge because the solo section is a few minutes long, plus there’s an outro solo. I played a bunch of different ideas, from Beck and Gilmour stuff to Slashy things.

“If there’s one lead that combines all of me, it’s that one. I come from more of a pentatonic background, to be honest. I don’t know if many extreme metal guitar players throw much blues into the mix.”

You’ve gone on record admitting how much you love John Frusciante – something extreme metal musicians don’t tend to say!

“I listened to Blood Sugar Sex Magik and Mother’s Milk religiously to practice my rhythms. When John came back for Californication, I loved what he did because it sounded pure and simple. Not many people could pull that off – playing a couple of notes as your leads.

“Just listen to what he did on the title track. It’s simple, but it works. John Frusciante can be amazingly soulful and atmospheric at the same time. I almost started crying when I first saw him play live. When I got involved in extreme music, people would say ‘Don’t mention RHCP,’ which felt weird!”

From Jeff Beck to your prog heroes, you clearly wear your influences with pride.

“There’s Blow By Blow and Wired, but I also love what Jeff did with other artists, like on Jon Bon Jovi’s Blaze of Glory. He played some crazy parts on Roger Waters’ Amused to Death. He was the only one who could do stuff like that. It’s not easy to copy.

“When I got serious on guitar I discovered King Crimson, Yes and Genesis. Sometimes I might use fourth and fifth intervals like Steve Howe. Robert Fripp is rhythmically interesting. I particularly love the Discipline album. It’s obvious Adam Jones took a lot of inspiration there; you can hear it in Tool. I hope to see the tour with Vai soon!”

• Enslaved have a handful of European festival dates lined up this year.

It’s far from easy to tell the definitive tale of any guitar that was used by a famous artist back in the day. The Oxblood is no exception, not least that it’s pretty much 50 years ago that Jeff Beck retired it. What we do know for a fact is that the guitar was auctioned at Christies on 22 January 2025 and sold for £1,068,500 (approx $1,315,708), making it the most expensive Gibson Les Paul ever sold at an auction.

Of course, that huge sale price has little, if anything, to do with the instrument itself. Imagine rocking up at a well-regarded vintage guitar dealer with a similar piece and asking for a valuation. The devaluation of what was once, purportedly, a 1954 Gibson Les Paul Goldtop would be colossal, wouldn’t it?

There’s the overall brown/black refinish for starters. The P-90-to-humbucker conversion for another. Non-original pots, caps and wiring, Schaller tuners… If it hadn’t already had a headstock break before you’d purchased it, not to mention a slimmed down neck, it had definitely had one at the end of its working life – not just a head repair but a totally new neck. And its overall condition was, at best, shoddy.

“Basically, what you’ve got there is the body and perhaps the fingerboard of a ’54 Les Paul,” says our hypothetical dealer.

Yes, our tongue is in our cheek, but that’s the reality, isn’t it? There are still questions around the origin of the guitar, who did the conversion/repair work, and what pickups were in the guitar on purchase. There’s even some dispute over when Jeff bought it.

What can be classed as hard evidence is the much better documented use that Beck put it to. From the original outings with Beck, Bogert and Appice – the reason he needed another Les Paul – to guesting on the encores of Ziggy’s last gig in July 1973, the Oxblood was played with Stevie Wonder, Billy Preston, The Rolling Stones and many more. And let’s not forget its use on and appearance on the cover of seminal album Blow By Blow. That’s not in dispute.

How he got the guitar – and even when – still is, some would argue. A young Memphis guitar fanatic, Buddy Davis, had befriended Jeff when he was still in The Yardbirds.

“I had met him at about 13, he was 20, and playing with The Yardbirds at a skating rink in Memphis,” he states in The Jeff Beck Bulletin #15. “In 1972, Charlie and Chris at Strings & Things were stuck with the ’54 Oxblood when the person they built it for decided he didn’t want it. That guitar was mine, I bought it from Robert Johnson … who auditioned with Jeff and Rory Gallagher and Wayne Perkins for The Stones. He had two of them he got from George Gruhn in Nashville.

“One went to me, one went to Marc Bolan of T.Rex. I have a picture of Marc with his. [NB: an image exists of Robert Johnson with Marc Bolan and an oxblood-coloured Les Paul with P-90s still in place. Two Oxbloods?] I loved the neck on mine, but did not like the noisy standard pickups. I traded it to Chris and Charlie. Then they had a man named Teddy Paige, who worked for them, customise it. The customer who it was customised for backed out.”

The aforementioned Robert Johnson – now CEO of Florida’s Regent Sound studio and who has a more than enviable CV as a player and producer – is the subject of a story provided by Regent Sound that appeared on PR Newswire on 30 January 2025 (after the Christie’s auction sale), which states that Johnson bought a ’53 Les Paul Goldtop from a Memphis music teacher in June 1972 and that “Johnson had John Evans, the former Boxtops keyboardist, modify the pickups and bridge, and Tom Keckler spray-painted the guitar at Strings & Things Music Store using auto-paint to match Johnson’s 1960 Oxblood shoes.”

The resulting colour was not to Johnson’s liking, apparently, and the guitar was put on consignment.

The story continues on 7 November 1972: “Johnson drove to Little Rock to see his friend Billy Gibbons and ZZ Top open a show for Beck, Bogart [sic] and Appice, all acquaintances of Johnson. Johnson sold Beck a 1967 Fender guitar in 1971 and had played a studio session with Beck previously in NYC.

“Beck asked Gibbons and Johnson about any good guitars for sale. Johnson replied that he had 17, including the Oxblood Les Paul at Strings & Things. Beck had a friend take him to Strings & Things the next day. Beck loved the Oxblood Les Paul and his manager bought it.”

Buddy Davis was at the same Little Rock gig, so perhaps he was the “friend” the Regent Sound story refers to, and the way Davis tells it is that Jeff called him the following day. They did a tour of Memphis music (and car part) stores, but Jeff reportedly had his eye on Buddy’s Oxblood, which his manager bought.

But what about the customisation? Aside from the pickup-modding keyboard player mentioned by Johnson, he also namechecks Tom ‘TK’ Keckler, a well-known figure who started customising guitars in the late ’60s, then worked for Mike Ladd’s Guitar City before joining up with Strings & Things in, we believe, 1972.

He then worked with Schecter and founded the St Blues guitar company. TK posted an image of Beck on Facebook in 2019 with the following caption: “The famous Jeff Beck Oxblood 1954 Gibson Les Paul – restored by me in 1971. The instrument had suffered a broken headstock, was completely refinished, refretted and P-90s replaced with humbuckers. Jeff was in Memphis to record the self-titled LP the Jeff Beck Group [aka the ‘Orange Album’] – tried the guitar and loved it!”

In a video interview (TKs Guitar History-Episode 2 on Tom Keckler’s YouTube channel), TK says: “It was a trashed Les Paul… We rebuilt it. When it came to the paint job, I was striving for a kind of a brown tint… About that time, Jeff was in town recording the ‘Orange Album’ [which began in January ’72 and was released in May/June of the same year].”

TK’s video host, Richard Wilson, explains that Jeff came to Strings & Things to check out the guitar, liked it and bought it. “[I’d put in] full-size humbuckers,” says TK. “I’m sure they were Patent Applied Fors or something, back then they were a dime a dozen. The headstock was broken; it was trashed.”

If the origins of the guitar are still open to conjecture, there was at least one more serious repair noted in the essay by Christie’s for the auction catalogue (a very good read!): “At some point between the three North American legs of the [BBA] tour [in 1975], the headstock of the Les Paul was broken on a PanAm flight back to London. Whilst with Gordon Wells at Knight Guitars for repair, Jeff took the opportunity to return the neck to its original size, retaining the guitar’s original fingerboard and faceplate.”

“Yes, my dad Gordon Wells did the work,” confirms Rob Wells today. “The headstock had been broken and Jeff said he didn’t really like the neck, so my dad actually made a new neck for the guitar – bigger!”

As far as we know, that was the last of the Oxblood’s repairs and modifications.

“After the tour, Jeff largely retired the Les Paul in favour of the Strat,” continues Christie’s, “and although it was taken out on subsequent tours during the later 1970s, it appears not to have been played live.”

It would be a good two decades before the Oxblood was “dusted off by Gibson’s master craftsmen in 2008 in order to recreate the iconic instrument for their limited-edition [2009] Jeff Beck Oxblood Les Paul signature model”, concludes the Christie’s essay.

The 2009 Gibson Custom Shop ‘Inspired By’ 1954 Jeff Beck VOS Les Paul was a limited run of 50 aged pieces, signed and played by Jeff Beck, and a further 100 unsigned pieces in a more standard VOS finish.

The PR for that release goes some way to supporting some of TK’s story: “While recording in Memphis, Beck paid a visit to a popular music store called Strings & Things to check out the stock. The guitar that caught his attention was a ’54 Gibson Les Paul.”

For this 2025 release, we’re told that “Epiphone collaborated with the Custom Shop to develop the Epiphone version, using the 2009 Custom Shop model as the reference point. The neck profile was derived from the specifications listed on the 2009 CS spec sheet and is loosely based on the 1954 shape”.

The new model’s launch PR side-stepped any mention of its history, aside from referring to it as “the heavily modified 1954 Les Paul that was immortalised on the cover of his groundbreaking 1975 album, Blow By Blow”. And so it goes…

We can only hope you can weave your own tales wielding the new Epiphone version. And if a crumb of Jeff Beck’s magic rubs off on you, that can’t be bad, can it?

• This article first appeared in Guitarist. Subscribe and save.

Ricky Byrd spent over a decade playing alongside Joan Jett as a member of Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, with his contribution to what many consider Jett's golden era earning him a spot in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Now, the guitarist, who has just released his fourth solo album, NYC Made, is looking back at that heady era – and reflecting on the electric guitar gear changes that he's since made.

“I was a Marshall guy back then with Joan,” Byrd tells Guitar World. “Now I literally cannot listen to Marshalls. I use a lot of small old Fender amps. That all came about after I went to see Jeff Beck play at the Iridium in New York, Les Paul’s old club.

“Jeff was using two small Fender Pro Junior amps – 15 watts, two knobs – Volume and Tone, and that’s it. So I went on eBay and found one. I just mic it up and it’s loud as shit. And I can carry it with two fingers.”

Beck wasn't the only guitar great who inspired Byrd's gear choices. In fact, his entire guitar-playing journey boils down to two guitarists – George Harrison and Keith Richards – and two historic performances that ushered in the British Invasion.

“I was around nine when I saw the Rolling Stones and the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show,” he recollects. “I was instantly attracted to George Harrison and Keith Richards’ guitar playing, so I asked my mom if I could get a guitar.

“She was working at a handbag company, and her boss gave her a gift – for me – on my birthday, a no-name acoustic. That little acoustic was how I first learned to play guitar.

“The second guitar I got, which was my first electric, didn’t even have a name, but it was from a store called Lafayette Electronics. It looked like a Gibson ES-335, but it was cheap and came with a little amp.”

In more recent Ricky Byrd news, the guitarist has recalled his worst onstage experience, which may or may not involve being wrongly accused of stealing gear.

Back in 1992, Guitar World sat down with the creative triumvirate at the head of Spinal Tap – guitarists David St. Hubbins and Nigel Tufnel, and bassist Derek Smalls.

The occasion was Break Like the Wind, the band's highly-anticipated 1992 reunion album. It saw the group move proudly forward with their humorous, hooky brand of brash heavy rock, while also having some looks back – in the form of the proto-Tap skiffle tune, All the Way Home, and the flower-power throwback, Rainy Day Sun – at their musical journey to that point.

Most notable, though, was the album's title track – a proggy epic that featured not one, not two, not three, but four guest guitar solos from a dream team of six-string gods – Jeff Beck, Joe Satriani, Steve Lukather, and Slash.

It was, St. Hubbins and Smalls told Guitar World, meant to be a surprise tribute to Tufnel, ever their tone-master and fretboard-melter. Touching, eh?

Tufnel, though, was if anything a bit miffed by the headline-grabbing lead spots – intruding as they did on his creative vision.

Asked by Guitar World to discuss the track in question, St. Hubbins pointed to the surprise factor as being a sore point, saying “He [Nigel] is a bit sensitive about it. He really didn't know about all this.” Tufnel added, with a touch of bite, “It's what you call a sucker punch.”

The two guitarists proceeded to bicker a bit, with St. Hubbins maintaining that the collaborations were merely intended as a nice tribute, and that Tufnel misunderstood the intention of it.

“I understood it very well,” he countered. “It was a surprise – that part of it worked – and I understand the tribute part, but I walk in and see on the board, from left to right, ‘Neve’ [the recording console], then ‘Beck, Satriani, Lukather, Slash.’ I thought it was a send-up. As if I'd said, ‘Here's the vocal track: David Bowie.’ [David St. Hubbins] would have gone, ‘Ha ha ha. Very funny.’ ‘No, David. The real David Bowie is singing on this instead of you!’”

The guitarist went on to say that he merely wanted to be let in on the decision: “The point is, ask me. Say, ‘Nige, what 'bout this idea?’ Give me the chance to say no.”

St. Hubbins, in turn, said, “And you would have said no, because of your modesty. What we asked them was, ‘How would you like to come in and replace eight bars by your idol, a person you respect?’ They really do respect Nigel.”

“You know, you can't pay Jeff Beck just to play on your record,” Derek Smalls added. “You can't ring up the musicians' union and say, ‘Give me Jeff Beck's number.’ It would cost you a fortune just to have him come in and do an eight-bar solo. He did it out of respect. And Nigel's too modest to acknowledge that.”

Spinal Tap would later go on to share the stage with, among others, Satriani. In that case, Tufnel – while coming away amazed by the former's virtuosity – certainly, and unsurprisingly, had the upper hand when it came to volume.

What is it?

Jeff Beck needs no introduction and neither do his guitars. The ‘Yardburst’ and the ‘Oxblood’ Les Pauls, to name but two, are ever-linked to defining periods of the late, great guitarist’s storied past. Recently Gibson Custom launched a rather fine 130-only replica of the former in 2024 aimed at well-heeled collectors, now Epiphone, in collaboration with Gibson Custom, has now shone the light on the latter with an everyman model that’s some £8k less expensive.

Specs

• Launch price: $1,299 /£1,199/€1,399
• Made: China
• Type: Solidbody electric
• Body: Mahogany back w/ maple cap
• Neck: One-piece mahogany w/ long tenon
• Fingerboard / Radius: Bound rosewood/ 12”
• Scale length: 24.75” (629mm)
• Nut/width: 42.9mm
• Frets: 22, medium
• Hardware: Gibson Historic wraparound bridge/tailpiece, Grover Rotomatic tuners
• Electrics: 2x Gibson Custombuckers, 3-way toggle pickup selector switch, individual pickup volume and tone controls
• Weight: 8.56lb (3.89kg)
• Left-handed options: No
• Finishes: Oxblood only
• Case: Hardshell case with Inspired by Gibson Custom graphics
• Contact: epiphone.com

Build quality

Build quality rating: ★★★★☆

Jeff Beck’s original was an already mucked about with 1954 Goldtop when he bought it in late 1972: its P-90 single coils replaced with Patent Applied For humbuckers and the original finish swapped for this chocolate brown opaque that apparently he coined ‘Oxblood’.

The muted low gloss sheen to the finish here, like the Vintage Gloss of the recent Reissue models, certainly doesn’t appear new. It also hides any glimpse of the woods used, although Epiphone spec the usual for the full-depth mahogany/maple body and a one-piece neck with its long-tenon join.

Again, like the new Reissues the Oxblood returns to a decent-looking rosewood fingerboard with what I’d call ‘medium’, frets and those bright “aged mother-of-pearl” trapezoid inlays.

Directly before the separate Tune-O-Matic bridge and stud tailpiece, the 1954 Les Paul used a combined wrapover, like a Les Paul Junior, and that’s what we have here. The original has retro-fitted Schaller M6 tuners and so should this one according to the spec but ours are Grover Rotomatics.

The pretty crude work on the original is replicated to a certain extent: the bridge humbucker is very closely placed to the bridge leaving that untidy gap on the unbevelled, and slightly sharp-edged pickguard.

The Oxblood sticks with Gibson USA Custombuckers, uncovered to match a post-purchase mod by Beck; the wiring is period-correct fifties-style with decent CTS pots, a Switchcraft toggle switch and a pair of .022µF Mallory 150 series 400V polyester capacitors.

Playability

Playability rating: ★★★★☆

After testing some heavy Reissue Les Pauls I'm pleasantly surprised that this one is relatively light: a good start. But the neck is something else: it’s one of the biggest necks on a production guitar I’ve ever handled and its description – ‘Jeff Beck Custom Large C’ – is understatement.

Does this huge girth make the frets feel smaller? Well, they’re definitely more vintage feeling but the supplied set-up feels good and the tuning stability – no doubt helped by the rock-solid girder of a neck – is superb.

Without individual string adjustment on the bridge, intonation is slightly compromised – although that never bothered Beck or indeed any of us Junior/Special devotees. Also, the low four strings here were all a little sharp at the first fret due to slightly domed string grooves at the nut which needed a couple of passes with a fret file to fix.

Sounds

Sounds rating: ★★★★★

If you’re a believer that a big neck equals big sound, not least when paired with this near light-weight body, here’s a guitar you might want to try. It’s working like it should, pretty vibrant with a full-bodied acoustic ring.

In theory, the bridge pickup placement should result in an over-sharp response, not least without a cover, but while there’s plenty of bite, it just adds to the sonic range and that, of course, is what the master was all about. Again these Custombuckers seem the perfect choice: pulling back the volume and tone and that bridge is almost single coil sounding, pick close to the wrapover and chicken-pick away while at full chat there’s just a classic biting yet throaty roar.

I have no complaints with the neck pickup’s default jazz/blues’n’rock voice either. In middle position, is there a little more sparkle due to the subtly wider pickup spacing? Well, it’s not lacking and again pull back those controls and it’s chime-y and more than suited to the sometimes funkier styles Beck was moving into with the original. You might not get close to his virtuosity but the sounds are here.

Verdict

This homage to Beck’s last Les Paul is a timely reminder of a true great. Will you sound like him when you plug it in? We wish. No, this is simply a good unshowy Les Paul with a great backstory and more importantly a wide range of very useable sounds. The huge neck does seem a bold step on a production model but it adds to the character, and this one has that in spades.

Guitar World verdict: This Epiphone repro of the most expensive-ever Gibson Les Paul sold at auction is not only considerably less money, it’s one of the best Epi’s yet: a very fit-for-purpose working Les Paul.

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• Epiphone Kirk Hammett 'Greeny' 1959 Les Paul Standard review 

Epiphone has honored Jeff Beck by releasing the Inspired by Gibson Custom 1954 Les Paul Oxblood – an affordable reimagining of the late electric guitar great’s original iconic Oxblood Les Paul.

As far as Les Pauls go, Beck’s Oxblood is up there with some of the guitar world’s most notable examples, and comfortably rubs shoulders with the likes of Greeny, Jimmy Page’s Number 1, Peter Frampton’s Phenix, Billy Gibbons’ Pearly Gates and others.

• Epiphone Jeff Beck 1954 Les Paul Oxblood review

Not only is it one of the most iconic Les Pauls of all time, it is also arguably one of Beck’s most legendary instruments and, alongside his fabled Custom Shop Strat and Yardburst Les Paul, was responsible for a number of the virtuoso’s influential moments.

It can be seen on the cover of Blow By Blow – and was used for a number of songs on that record – and became a primary performance six-string that saw plenty of stage action with Beck over the years.

During its life, the Oxblood underwent a series of mods, further adding to its mythical status. Such tweaks include a neck replacement, refinish, pickup swap and more.

In the past, it has been the subject of a Gibson Custom Shop remake (now since discontinued), and last year, the guitar itself went under the hammer as part of a bumper Jeff Beck auction event hosted by Christie’s.

The entire collection of gear sold for $10.7 million, and the Oxblood in particular broke the record for the most expensive Gibson Les Paul ever sold, usurping Duane Allman’s 1957 LP with an eventual fee of $1,315,708.

For the Epiphone revival – described as “a tribute to one of the most iconic electric guitars in history” – a maple-capped mahogany body is paired with a ‘Jeff Beck Custom Large C’ profile mahogany neck and 22-fret rosewood fingerboard, as well as that irresistible Oxblood finish.

As per the source material, a sole wraparound bridge is utilized – a Gibson Historic Aluminum Wraparound example, specifically – as is a pair of uncovered Custombuckers that, while sounding different to the pups in Beck’s original, certainly keep the aesthetic authentic.

Other neat touches include Schaller M6 90 tuners, the Gibson ‘Open Book’ headstock that has become commonplace on Inspired by Gibson Epiphone models, aged mother of pearl trapezoid inlays and a 12” fretboard radius.

“His heavily modified 1954 Les Paul, known to millions as the Oxblood due to its unique chocolate brown/oxblood finish, was immortalized on the cover of his first solo album, the groundbreaking Blow by Blow,” explains Epiphone.

“The original Oxblood recently sold at auction for a record-setting $1.3 million. In 2009, Gibson Custom recreated the Oxblood in a limited edition run of only 50 aged guitars, which collectors still highly value.”

At the time of the auction, our sister publication Guitarist sat down with Amelia Walker, Caitlin Graham and Kerry Keane of Christie’s to discuss the Oxblood’s significance.

“Without a doubt, you pick this guitar up and you realise that it has been rode hard and put away wet. It’s a well-used instrument,” said Keane.

The Epiphone Jeff Beck Oxblood 1954 Les Paul is available now for $1,299.

Head over to Epiphone for more and read our Epiphone Jeff Beck 1954 Les Paul Oxblood review.

Jeff Beck's “YardBurst” was recently taken out for a spin in Europe courtesy of Craig Ross – Lenny Kravitz's longtime guitarist and collaborator – after going under the hammer for $496,484 (£403,200) earlier this year.

That was just the beginning of the legendary circa ’59 Gibson Les Paul's new lease on life, facilitated by its current owner, Matthieu Lucas, from the high-profile Parisian guitar emporium, Matt's Guitar Shop. Just a few days ago, it was wielded by not one, but three luminaries from the modern guitar vanguard – namely, Marcus King, Drew Smithers, and JJ Julius Son from KALEO – at Colorado's Red Rocks Amphitheatre.

“It was a major event celebrating the release of KALEO’s Mixed Emotions album,” explains Lucas. “JJ, the lead singer of the band, is one of my closest friends, and when I saw Marcus King was opening, I grabbed my ticket and brought the YardBurst along to keep its story going at Red Rocks.”

Lucas is quickly establishing himself as a guitar matchmaker of sorts, having lent the YardBurst to Ross, but also entrusting Steve Jones’ Sex Pistols Les Paul to Yungblud, Green Day's Billie Joe Armstrong, and Sum 41's Deryck Whibley just last year. This latest link-up is a continuation of his mission to “have the next generation of players bring the YardBurst to life”.

Blues- and Southern rock-leaning King brandished Jeff Beck's guitar for the first three songs of his set, “including The Well [from 2020’s El Dorado], and it was mind-blowing,” before handing it over to JJ., who used it on three or four songs, including one of Lucas' favorites, Hey Gringo.

“What was fascinating was how different their playing styles are, yet in each case, the YardBurst’s legendary tone really shone through,” he explains. “It just clicked every time.”

Despite the risk associated with having such prestigious guitars out on the road, Lucas isn’t interested in locking them up in a vault somewhere, never to be seen or heard again. As he aptly puts it, lending these legendary guitars to contemporary players is crucial to “carry the torch forward”.

“If you look at the music industry long-term, in 10 to 15 years – maybe even sooner – many of today’s legends might no longer be touring,” he asserts. “What better way to honor the past than by letting the YardBurst, which was once played by Jimmy Page, Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, and many others, live on through the hands of today’s artists?”

As for his shortlist of guitarists he'd like to see wield the YardBurst? “Eric Clapton would be a dream” and “Joe Perry would also be amazing – he loved Jeff Beck. Joe Bonamassa would surely pay a beautiful tribute too. Showing the guitar to Jimmy Page once more would be a huge honor.”

However, Lucas insists that “all guitarists are welcome to play it. Legendary instruments are meant to be played and to inspire future generations.” This writer will keep that in mind next time I'm in Paris!

Matt's Guitar Shop has developed quite a reputation for acquiring high-profile guitars and then giving them a new lease on life in the hands of current touring musicians.

After last year's successful experiment of lending out Steve Jones' 1974 Les Paul Custom to not one, but three musicians – Yungblud, Green Day's Billie Joe Armstrong, and Sum 41's Deryck Whibley – Matt's Guitar Shop is now replicating that proof of concept with their recently acquired Yardburst: Jeff Beck's circa ’59 Gibson Les Paul, which fetched $496,484 (£403,200) at auction earlier this year.

“To me, with my taste for Jeff Beck’s journey and my love for the British Blues Explosion, this guitar was the sleeper hit of the whole auction,” says Matthieu Lucas, the owner and curator of the guitar menagerie.

“Everyone was focused on other pieces, but the Yardburst showed up early in the sale – and that’s what made this beautiful, unexpected story possible. It felt like fate. A moment where everything aligned.”

However, Lucas didn't just store it in a safe somewhere, collecting dust. Instead, he conspired with Lenny Kravitz's longtime guitarist, Craig Ross, to take it out for a spin on the entire European leg of the Blue Electric Light tour.

“Funny thing – this is actually the first time I’ve ever lent one of my guitars out for an entire European tour,” confesses Lucas. “I called Craig – I think he was in Germany – and told him the idea. He was immediately into it, super-happy.

“We locked it in a few weeks before the Paris show. Actually, just days after the auction, I sent Craig a photo of the guitar, and he had the same reaction I did – this guitar is a living icon.

He continues, “Lending him the Yardburst meant as much to me as if it were going to Slash, Billy Gibbons, Lenny… you name it. People don’t always realize how lucky they are to hear Craig Ross live right now.

“Craig even mentioned that Jeff Beck used to love seeing him and Lenny play live! So it feels full circle. Especially when Craig played the Yardburst at Paris La Défense Arena – 45,000 people hearing that epic solo on Bring It On. Unreal.”

The Yardburst's tenure with Ross may be over, but that doesn't mean the guitar will be locked away, never to be seen again. On the contrary, Lucas' real plan is to “make sure this guitar keeps living. Breathing. Being played.

“It’s not meant to sit in a case – that’s not the Jeff Beck way,” he concludes. “So yes, it will be played again. On stages. In front of people. That’s the only future I see for it.”

Last January, Jeff Beck's guitar collection sold for an astounding $10.7 million at auction, which saw some of the icon’s most noteworthy guitars – including his 1954 ‘Oxblood’ Gibson Les Paul – go under the hammer.

Rockabilly rover Mick Rogers has a knack for being in the right place at the right time – usually. Best known as lead guitarist in Manfred Mann’s Earth Band between ’71 and ’75, he’s played alongside a host of rock icons.

His right-place-right-time good fortune, however, wasn’t operating when he left the Earth Band a year before their hit cover of Bruce Springsteen’s Blinded by the Light. He did, however, later reunite with them, and in the intervening years he led and played in many bands – most notably Aviator – and was even in consideration to replace Peter Gabriel in Genesis.

Can you recall your first emotional connection with the guitar?

“I had a musical family. My dad was a drummer, my auntie was a keyboard player, and my uncle, who lived with us, was a guitarist and double bass player. A big moment came when Elvis hit with Heartbreak Hotel. Keith Richards, Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck especially – they’d say it was the turning moment in rock. I remember that day.

“One afternoon I took my uncle’s guitar – a Levin acoustic – to a talent contest on the coast at Dovercourt in Essex, and I played Mystery Train by Elvis. When the small applause came, I thought: ‘This is exactly what I want to do.’”

When did your career take off?

“I performed a lot throughout my teenage years, and eventually moved to London; there were more musical opportunities for me there. I got a tour with the Vision, the backing band for Adam Faith and Helen Shapiro. Then Normie Rowe – an enormous pop star in Australia – asked me to join his band, the Playboys.

“There was something about being an English musician, which meant something in Australia at the time. I don’t know what it means now. Probably not a lot! When touring in Australia, we had musicians ask us, ‘This Eric Clapton guy, are his sideburns still as long as they were?’ It wasn’t about the guitar – it was about how he looked!

“In 1967 Normie was called up for national service, so we formed the Procession from members of the Playboys.”

What was your go-to gear for Manfred Mann’s Earth Band?

“I’ve always been a Strat cat – I think a Strat can sound like a Les Paul, but it doesn’t necessarily work the other way round; in those days especially. I had a Gibson SG that I brought back from Australia, but it was falling apart. When the Earth Band played 10 consecutive shows in Rome to get us up and running, I saw this fantastic Les Paul and I said: ‘That’s the guitar for me.’”

You got one of your most-prized Les Pauls thanks to Frank Zappa. How did that happen?

“Years later when on an Earth Band tour, we supported Frank. His management said to our bass player, Colin Pattenden, ‘Frank was wondering if you could step in, because our bass player has to go back to LA.’ Colin said: ‘I’m not the guy you want. Mick is – he’s a bass player and he’s a big Zappa nut.’

“There I was, all of a sudden, at sound check with George Duke and Chester Thompson; all my heroes. Frank came over and said, ‘I’ve been told you’re a fan. The first tune we do is a tune called Pygmy Twylyte.’ I said, ‘Do you do it in the same key you recorded it in?’ Zappa went, ‘You really are a fan!’

“The Earth Band flew to Miami the next day to finish the Uriah Heep tour. I didn’t sleep that night. I was still pumped up. Zappa’s management insisted on paying me for the gig – and with that money I bought a Les Paul Deluxe.

“Years later, when Frank came to Australia, we had dinner. He didn’t eat much, though; he lived on black coffee and cigarettes. I never saw him eat anything.”

Can you recall the biggest audiences the Earth Band played to?

“It was Randwick Racecourse in Sydney, Australia, with Free and Deep Purple. That was one of the first big audiences. It was a very successful tour for us and we were able to go back and do our own tour. We did an extra gig with Deep Purple, but Free didn’t do it.

“Purple were really nice to us. We had a situation over there with a promoter, Sammy Lee, who was a bit of a mafia guy. He wanted us to do an extra concert but refused to pay us. It got really nasty, but Deep Purple were great supporters of ours. They could see that we were going through some strife there. Ritchie Blackmore was great… he’s another rockabilly guy.”

Kiss supported you shortly after the release of their first album. What was that like?

“I had to use the same microphone that Gene Simmons used with all the blood coming out of his mouth! I remember Simmons telling me, ‘We’re either going to be the next biggest thing, or we’re going to die on our ass!’

“When they went onstage with the makeup and stuff, people were quite silent because they just couldn’t believe what they were seeing. Nor could we! They were scary – Gene Simmons was a scary looking image. But he was lovely.”

In 1975 you split with the Earth Band. Was it a shock?

“I’d become a real pain. I wasn’t grown-up enough, although I should have been. But my head was taken by the Zappa thing. I went to the studio one time, to talk about new material, I thought, and they said, ‘Mick, I’m afraid you’ve been voted out.’

“I went back to Australia and performed with some great people over there. I got a lot of nonsense out of my head. Blinded by the Light entered the top 100; then it was 80; then it got to Number One. I remember thinking, ‘Maybe I should have hung around a bit!’” I rejoined Manfred Mann after 10 years away.

More recently, you had the pleasure of getting to know the late Jeff Beck.

“I got together with Jeff on Valentine’s Day a few years ago. His manager – a great friend of mine, Colin Newman – put us together. The famous white Strat was sitting on the couch so I said, ‘Jeff, pick it up and play it!’ He was very sheepish, but what a guy!

“We could empty a room because we were just talking about rockabilly and how he grew up. We were both Cliff Gallup fans. I believe I’ve got the last recording Jeff ever did in the studio; we got together with some rockabilly guys and did an album which hasn’t been released.”

Why not?

“Jeff was playing through a dodgy Marshall. We played Lucille by Little Richard, but Jeff didn’t like the sound. He said, ‘We’ll do it again later on.’ Of course, that didn’t happen, and he went on tour with Johnny Depp instead.

“When I listen to the track now, I think: ‘Jeff, there’s nothing wrong with your sound.’ He could have played through a paper cup and it would still have sounded like Jeff Beck! He was just wonderful.”

What’s your current guitar gear?

“In my solo work I use a red Stratocaster, plugged into a Kemper. I’ve got a ghost pickup on my Strat, which, with a flick of a switch, changes into an acoustic guitar. I use Rodenberg pedals – I introduced them to Steve Lukather, and he uses them to this day. They’re the business. All that and a Hughes & Kettner is everything I need.”

• Rogers’ current live schedule includes a solo tour and dates with the Earth Band.

Jeff Beck's final recording is thought to be his contribution to Mark Knopfler's charity single Going Home, released in March 2024. However, an artist as prolific as Beck will always have other sessions up their sleeve – and now Manfred Mann’s Earth Band guitarist Mick Rogers, in a new Guitar World interview, says that he might very well have the last recording Beck ever did.

“I went down to his house, his manager – a great friend of mine, Colin Newman – put us two together,” Rogers tells GW.

“We had a play together, and I believe I’ve got the last recording Jeff Beck ever did in the studios. We got together with some rockabilly guys and did an album which still hasn’t been released.

“I spent a day with Jeff and the famous white Strat was sitting on the couch. I thought: ‘Jeff, pick it up and play it!’ He was very sheepish, but what a guy! We could empty a room because we were just talking about rockabilly and how he grew up – we were both Cliff Gallup fans.”

As to why the potentially historic recording has never been released – well, it seems Beck wasn’t entirely happy with his tone.

“We played a track called Lucille by Little Richard, but nothing came of it because Jeff was playing through his dodgy Marshall and didn’t like the sound,” Rogers explains.

"He said: ‘We’ll do it again, later on.’ Of course, he then went on tour with Mr Depp. When I listen to the track now, I think: ‘Jeff, there’s nothing wrong with your sound.’ He could have played through a paper cup, and it still would have sounded like Jeff Beck! He was just wonderful.”

The Rogers-Beck session took place on August 24, 2022 – just a month after the release of 18, Beck's album alongside Johnny Depp. The album release was followed by an extensive tour, which Rogers alludes to in the interview, kicking off on September 23 in Del Valle, Texas and wrapping up on November 12, in Reno, Nevada – just two months before Beck passed away.

2022 also saw Beck feature on the title track of another record, Ozzy Osbourne's 13th studio album, Patient Number 9. Although no exact date of when Beck actually laid down his tracks in the studio has been revealed, we can safely assume he did so sometime between February 2020 and 2022 – as, upon the release of Ordinary Man in 2020, Osbourne announced that he had started working on its follow-up with super-producer Andrew Watt.

As for Mark Knopfler's star-studded Going Home, the date for when Beck recorded his reverb-soaked 20-second scene setter was never disclosed – but in a 2024 interview with Guitar Player, the Dire Straits guitarist did confirm that Beck's contribution was home-recorded as opposed to Rogers' in-studio session. Therefore, it seems highly likely that Rogers is indeed in possession of Beck's last-ever studio recording.

What happens when one of the world’s most esteemed composers works with one of the greatest-ever guitar players? Well, when Hans Zimmer and Jeff Beck teamed up in the 1990s, it involved the renowned film composer showing the late guitar hero a thing or two on his instrument of choice.

Zimmer’s body of work spans sci-fi epics, superhero blockbusters and family friendly flicks, from Inception and Interstellar to Kung Fu Panda and beyond. He’s also picked up a couple of Oscars along the way, and – of course – is adept at a number of instruments.

Yet, while he is a guitarist, Zimmer is not commonly associated with the instrument directly, thanks in part to Guthrie Govan’s role in his live shows. However, in a new conversation with Rick Beato, he’s singled out one particular electric guitar for praise.

“The Fender Stratocaster for me is an absolute piece of art,” Zimmer says. “The shape has been timeless, the electronics haven't really changed, but what it does which is so remarkable is that it amplifies the player.

“Jeff Beck sounds totally different from Stevie Ray Vaughan, who sounds totally different from Mark Knopfler,” he adds. “Each person's individuality is being amplified by this piece of wood, a couple of magnets, and some steel strings, it's fantastic.”

Naturally, the Jeff Beck namedrop prompted Zimmer to reflect on the time they worked together to soundtrack the 1990 NASCAR blockbuster, Days Of Thunder, featuring Tom Cruise.

The film was supposed to be 'Top Gun on wheels,' and so the partnership was formed in the hopes of recreating Steve Stevens' magic on that jet-fuelled score.

“I had to teach Jeff Beck a tune which was sort of [like], 'Here give me your guitar,' and then I was going, 'Oops, now I have to actually play!'” Zimmer remembers, before going on to discuss his love for Beck and his playing.

“I loved him and I loved his inventiveness, he was totally the most inventive. I said to him, 'Why don't you use a pick?' and he goes, 'Because I lose them!' He got really good at something because he was really bad at remembering where he put his pick.

“His tone was singular,” Zimmer goes on. “When he played the blues it was amazing; beautiful and so inventive.”

The German composer, who has bagged five Grammy wins since scoring his first film in 1982, has also spoken about his love for digital gear.

“I'm not a big analog versus digital guy. I was one of the first people to really get into computers and music,” he says. “I don't care how it's made, I love the way things are progressing.”

Guthrie Govan will know about his fondness for technology all too well, having been forced to embrace digital amp modelers when playing in Zimmer’s live band.

In related news, Tim Henson recently opened up to Guitar World about working with the legendary film score composer.

Jeff Beck’s Blow by Blow shouldn’t have been a success. By all accounts, it was a huge risk, even in the heady, more musically adventurous era of the mid-’70s. It was an instrumental album – an instrumental jazz album.

Perhaps oddest of all, it was an instrumental jazz album by a rock guitarist, which meant that it ran a highly possible risk of alienating rock and jazz audiences alike. And even though Epic Records released separate singles of three songs from the album in Japan, the U.K. and the U.S., none of the songs became hits.

Yet audiences in the United States, United Kingdom and beyond enthusiastically embraced Blow by Blow. It peaked at a remarkable Number 4 on the Billboard 200 album chart and earned Platinum certification, outselling every single album Beck previously released with the Jeff Beck Group and Beck, Bogert & Appice, which all managed to go Gold. In fact, Blow by Blow (along with its similar follow-up, Wired) remains the best-selling album of Beck’s entire career.

However, the success of Blow by Blow was much wider reaching than mere chart positions and album sales figures. Beck’s bold move opened up new possibilities for jazz and progressive guitarists like Al Di Meola, Allan Holdsworth and numerous other musicians to release albums that appealed to jazz and rock fans alike.

It also helped spark the instrumental shred guitar phenomenon that started a few years later in the early ’80s by proving that there was indeed a relatively sizable potential audience for instrumental guitar music.

Its success even had a profound effect on Beck himself, giving him a sense of direction that influenced his remaining career by encouraging him to rely on his inner muse.

In celebration of the 50th anniversary of Blow by Blow, we’re taking a look back at the history of this revolutionary album that changed the path and popularity of the electric guitar in a highly profound way.

From blues to funk

During the early ’70s, Jeff Beck had earned a reputation as being difficult to work with that was not entirely undeserved. Ever since being fired from the Yardbirds in November 1966, Beck seemed unable or unwilling to settle into any particular musical direction for a prolonged period of time.

When Beck first put together the Jeff Beck Group with singer Rod Stewart in 1967, he went through a staggering variety of bass players and drummers before settling upon Ronnie Wood on bass and Micky Waller on drums just prior to recording their first album, 1968’s Truth.

However, Waller was gone by the second album (1969’s Beck-Ola), and by the third Jeff Beck Group album the guitarist was accompanied by an entirely different lineup as Beck shifted from a hard rock/blues focus to a more funk and R&B-inspired sound.

That second lineup managed to last two albums (Rough & Ready, Jeff Beck Group) before Beck threw in the towel during the summer of 1972. Retaining only keyboardist Max Middleton, Beck started a new lineup with Tim Bogert on bass and vocals and Carmine Appice on drums.

This eventually became the hard blues-rock power trio Beck, Bogert & Appice, but that band was also short-lived and broke up in early 1974 after releasing one studio album and a live album released in Japan.

In an interview with Classic Rock, Appice said, “Rod Stewart had told me long ago regarding Jeff: ‘Don’t do it. You’ll do an album or two, and then it’ll be over.’ We didn’t listen to that advice, but that’s what happened. It ended up a mess at the end.”

Reports of arguments and physical altercations suggested that Beck was nearly impossible to work with, which was partly true. However, the main reason why the guitarist went through so many different lineups is that he was still searching to find his own musical voice.

It was particularly frustrating for Beck when his good friend Jimmy Page experienced greater success with Led Zeppelin using a similar heavy blues-rock formula Beck that pioneered on Truth, which preceded Led Zeppelin by about half a year. The fact that Zep also recorded a cover of Muddy Waters’ You Shook Me further salted his wounds.

Looking to move beyond the increasingly crowded blues-rock idiom, Beck became attracted to the allure of funk and R&B. This led to a botched attempt to record an album at Detroit’s legendary Motown studios in 1970 and the inspired, albeit ultimately underwhelming, hiring of Steve Cropper to produce the Jeff Beck Group album in 1972.

That album featured a cover version of Stevie Wonder’s I Got to Have a Song, which captured Wonder’s attention. Later that year, Wonder invited Beck to participate in sessions at Electric Lady studios in New York City for the album Talking Book. Beck played guitar on Lookin’ for Another Pure Love.

During the sessions, Beck also inspired Wonder to write Superstition when the guitarist was fooling around on the drums and came up with a driving, funky beat. Jamming on a Hohner Clavinet keyboard, Wonder wrote what Beck called “the riff of the century.”

Wonder planned on giving the song exclusively to Beck as a gift, but Wonder’s management quickly saw its potential as a hit single and demanded that he record it himself.

Beck later recorded a heavy rock version of Superstition for the first Beck, Bogert & Appice album, but its impact was ultimately thwarted by the dynamic brilliance of Wonder’s single.

Apparently feeling somewhat guilty for the events that transpired with Superstition, Wonder later eventually delivered another gift to Beck that proved to be even more beneficial to the guitarist’s career.

Enter fusion

Sometime during the early ’70s, a mishap led to a profound life-changing event for Beck. While working in his garage trying to repair a car he had crashed, Beck had an epiphany.

“I was looking up at the wreck of the car that I’d crashed, thinking I was finished,” Beck wrote in his book Beck01: Hot Rods and Rock & Roll. “I was working underneath the car and could hardly move. My head was on the ground and water was coming down the driveway. A little transistor radio was playing Miles Davis’s Jack Johnson [the track was Right Off, which is the entirety of side one].

“Lying there in the water, I realized I wasn’t done yet, and this music was going to save me. I went inside and just sat there, sopping wet, listening to the album. I thought I’d been resurrected, like a phoenix. I went out and bought the record and then found out about [guitarist] John McLaughlin and [drummer] Billy Cobham.”

Beck kept his newfound passion for this burgeoning style of jazz known as fusion, which added new exploratory elements of rock and electric instruments to the jazz vernacular, mostly to himself over the next few years.

He was fascinated with the improvisational and rhythmic possibilities that jazz-fusion presented for expanding the rock repertoire, especially since he was beginning to grow tired of playing the same blues-rock riffs.

“A handful of tapes knock me out,” Beck told Steve Rosen in the November 1975 issue of Guitar Player, “things like Billy Cobham, Stanley Clarke – all the great rock and rollers. I call Billy Cobham a rock and roller because he’s so forceful. Rock’s an energy to me. It’s more complex now than it was, but it’s rock just the same.”

Carmine Appice later claimed that he introduced Beck to Billy Cobham’s 1973 Spectrum album during their time together in Beck, Bogert & Appice, but by that time Beck seemed to already be familiar with Cobham and McLaughlin’s work together in McLaughlin’s post-Miles Davis band, the Mahavishnu Orchestra.

In fact, Beck allegedly cancelled shows by Beck, Bogert & Appice so he could attend the Mahavishnu Orchestra’s concerts in New York’s Central Park in August 1973. Even if Appice and Beck did share a common love of fusion music, that never emerged as a direction pursued by their band.

“I remember Mahavishnu Orchestra playing in Central Park at the Schaefer Music Festival in August 1973,” Beck wrote in Beck01.

“Between Nothingness & Eternity was the live album that resulted from that concert. There was something like 30,000 people watching this ridiculously high-powered music: jazz-rock fusion, furious playing and outrageous time signatures. I thought, ‘This is more like it,’ and that’s where Blow by Blow came from.”

McLaughlin’s guitar playing with the Mahavishnu Orchestra was raw, exhilarating and blazingly fast, as were Tommy Bolin’s guitar performances with Cobham on Spectrum. Both impressed Beck significantly, but the guitarist actually took more inspiration from the synthesizer player that both groups (as well as Stanley Clarke) shared in common: Jan Hammer.

“Jan gave me a new, exciting look into the future,” Beck told Guitar Player in 1975. “He plays the Moog a lot like a guitar, and his sounds went straight into me. So I started playing like him. I didn’t sound like him, but his phrases influenced me immensely.”

Possibly the ultimate turning point for Beck was when Mahavishnu Orchestra released Apocalypse in April 1974, which happened to be about the same time Beck disbanded Beck, Bogert & Appice and was seriously considering releasing a jazz-fusion album as a solo artist as his next career move.

McLaughlin had assembled a new lineup for his group, replacing Cobham and Hammer with drummer Narada Michael Walden and keyboardist Gayle Moran, respectively, but Beck barely noticed the absence of some of his favorite players. Instead, he was particularly blown away by the dynamic blend of aggressive guitar accompanied by lush orchestral arrangements performed by the London Symphony Orchestra.

Apocalypse was expertly produced by Sir George Martin, who called it “one of the best records I have ever made” in his 1979 book All You Need Is Ears. The album’s immaculate sound quality and energy convinced Beck that he needed to hire Martin to produce his solo album.

“I turned up at George Martin’s office with a diabolically bad demo,” Beck recalled, “but he could see there was something there.” Martin agreed to sign on to the project, and in October 1974 work on Blow by Blow commenced at London’s AIR studios.

The lineup

Beck reunited with keyboardist Max Middleton to write material and record Blow by Blow. Initially Carmine Appice played drums on the early sessions, but he was fired after he insisted on having his name appear prominently alongside Beck’s on the album cover.

“Carmine kicked up such a fuss about him wanting it to be his album,” Middleton told journalist Bruce Stringer in 2003, “so Jeff kicked him off and asked me if I knew anybody else. I brought in [drummer] Richard Bailey and [bassist] Phillip Chen because I knew them for some time, and that was how we did that album.”

Although Blow by Blow is commonly described as a jazz-rock fusion album, it’s really more of a jazz-funk fusion effort.

“I was constantly trying to put funk into the record,” Beck said. “I was influenced by Larry Graham’s Graham Central Station, which I was listening to on a loop in my car at the time. I played George [Martin] a couple of tracks, and he said it was the worst-recorded sound he’d ever heard.

“George wanted Beatles-esque orchestrations and strong melodies. I didn’t really appreciate what George was doing to the extent he deserved. I should’ve known better than to underestimate him. I didn’t take much notice of what he was gently trying to push me to do.”

Beck won the argument, of course, since it was his solo album and his name appeared on the cover. The funk element is strong and present from the get-go, with scratchy funk chords that are more than obviously inspired by Jimmy Nolen’s playing on James Brown’s Sex Machine kicking off the album’s first track, You Know What I Mean, penned by Beck and Middleton.

However, Beck’s adventurous solos and complex lead melodies showed listeners used to his heavy rock bluster that he was venturing deep into new territory.

“That Blow by Blow opening is pure funk,” says John McLaughlin, who co-headlined Beck’s 1975 tour in support of Blow by Blow.

“I’m sure that’s why he hired [drummer] Bernard Purdie and [bassist] Wilbur Bascomb, who both came from James Brown’s band, as his rhythm section for the tour. When we both got together to jam at the end of each show, we would be dancing on stage with that rhythm section just kicking our butts.”

Allegedly George Martin was not the biggest fan of Middleton’s reggae-inspired arrangement of the Beatles’ She’s a Woman. Beck had actually publicly leaked this arrangement of the Lennon and McCartney tune earlier when he performed alongside the band Upp, who he was producing, on the BBC’s Five Faces of the Guitar special broadcast in September 1974.

The BBC broadcast possibly provides a glimpse at the main rig Beck used while recording Blow by Blow. Here the guitarist was seen playing his modified 1954 “Oxblood” Gibson Les Paul, an Ampeg VT-40 combo amp, Colorsound Overdriver, Cry Baby wah, ZB Custom volume pedal and Kustom “The Bag” talk box, the latter heard prominently on She’s a Woman.

Other gear that Beck is known to have used on the album includes two Stratocasters – an early ’70s Olympic White model and one with a stripped-finish early ’60s body and mid-’70s rosewood neck – and the famous “Tele-Gib” 1959 Telecaster with two PAF humbuckers assembled by Seymour Duncan.

The Beck composition Constipated Duck pulls the album back into funk territory with Middleton’s clavinet licks and Beck’s trippy double-stop echo tricks. The guitarist’s distinctive note bends offer the first glimpse at Jan Hammer’s influence. More Nolen-style chords kick off AIR Blower (credited to the entire band) before the song quickly settles into a funk-fusion groove.

Beck’s gritty fuzz tone solos and harmonized lines in tandem with Middleton’s synth take the guitarist about as far away from his blues-rock past as Mississippi is from Manhattan, further punctuated by Beck’s jazzy lines around the 3-1/2 minute mark where a slow, loose tempo shift occurs.

Side one closes with Scatterbrain co-written by Beck and Middleton, which sounds the closest to the reason why Beck hired Martin to produce the album in the first place.

Here, the orchestral string section that Martin wanted all along finally makes an appearance, although it’s more subdued than the arrangements Martin employed on Apocalypse. The jazz fusion element is present and accounted for in full force, with some passages even bearing a slight resemblance to Mahavishnu’s Vision Is a Naked Sword.

Wonder himself makes an uncredited appearance playing clavinet on Thelonious, which he also wrote during the Talking Book sessions.

This is arguably the deepest funk track on the album, with grooves and riffs that almost match Superstition. Beck uses a Mu-Tron Octave Divider to summon a downright nas-tay horn- or synth-like tone, punctuated by talk box accents.

Next, Freeway Jam finally delivers the track that most closely fits the jazz-rock fusion description. This was also the album’s closest thing to a hit, receiving heavy rotation on FM album rock stations throughout most of the remainder of the ’70s.

Here, Beck is definitely playing one of his Strats, liberally using the vibrato bar to accentuate notes with wild warbling bends and deep dives. Like Lovers it also became a fixture of Beck’s live set lists.

Diamond Dust ends Blow by Blow with the accompaniment of a second orchestral string arrangement by Martin.

The song was written by Bernie Holland, who was the guitarist in the band Hummingbird, formed in 1974 by Middleton and other members of the second iteration of the Jeff Beck Group. The song is as much of a showcase for Middleton’s electric piano and synth playing as it is for Beck’s melodic motifs and soloing.

Aftermath

Beck acknowledged John McLaughlin’s profound influence by inviting the Mahavishnu Orchestra on a co-headlining tour in 1975.

“We just wanted to see if it was going to work, and boy, did it work,” recalled Beck. “The next thing I knew I was on stage doing a double headliner with John. It was a bit barbaric and chaotic, but it was more music per square inch than l’d ever heard. When we opened the show, the audience went utterly berserk.”

Beck and McLaughlin’s cross-pollination of rock and jazz styles had made both outcasts of sorts from their respective main genres, but by banding together they helped lift each other up and beyond those restraints and biases.

McLaughlin was particularly touched by Beck’s acknowledgement of the Mahavishnu guitarist’s influence on his playing style.

“When you have an impact on somebody who is already a very fine musician, it’s kind of a little humbling, isn’t it?” McLaughlin says.

“Beck was kind of an outsider, and I got a lot of flak from the traditional jazz community where I was being told, ‘This ain’t jazz.’ But Jeff broke down those barriers, and now they’ve disappeared.

“Today it doesn’t matter what kind of music you play; it’s how you play it. When the spirit gets you, it doesn’t matter where you’re coming from – the spirit will be heard. Every musician that I know who heard Jeff loved him, and his spirit will live on forever.”

• This was a preview of the upcoming Jeff Beck biography Blow by Blow by Brad Tolinski & Chris Gill, scheduled for release in October by Grand Central/Hachette Books.

Billy Corgan recently invited Tom Morello to guest on his new The Magnificent Others interview series. During the conversation, he took the opportunity to voice a long-held theory that concerned him, the Rage Against the Machine titan, and one other electric guitar player who all formed a de facto ‘Yardbirds of metal’ trio.

As youngsters and aspiring musicians, Corgan and Morello both came from neighbouring areas, and as the Smashing Pumpkins frontman puts it in this new chat, they "grew up in the same atmosphere” and shared similar music experiences.

Corgan also namedrops Tool’s Adam Jones – who famously started a band with Morello during that time – as a third player to have shared social and sonic circles. They all listened to similar music, started rock bands, and wrote riff-driven music.

However, despite having near-identical interests – and having shared such similar experiences – when their careers took off, all three players branched out into significantly different niches.

Morello went down the activist rock route with Rage Against the Machine, Jones went progressive with Tool, and Corgan developed the Smashing Pumpkins’ alt-rock sound. It’s a branching of styles that has baffled Corgan ever since.

“I have this theory no-one seems to pick up on, so I'm bringing it to you,” Corgan says to Morello. “I'm sure I told you about this before, but I do find it fascinating that Adam [Jones] from Tool... obviously you guys had a band together when you were young.

“And there I am, living probably 20 miles away from you guys. We all grew up in the same atmosphere. We all started rock bands that were predominantly riff-driven… and we took music in three completely different directions. I find that really fascinating.”

That the three heavy players would be so closely connected by one shared musical experience, only to then split off and explore their own avenues, is not a new phenomenon.

In fact, almost the exact same thing happened in England, with Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page, all of whom grew up in Surrey, UK, and would go on to join the same band. It’s a shared phenomenon that clearly hasn’t gone unnoticed by Corgan.

“Somebody will get mad at me, but it's the closest thing to Beck, Clapton and Page kind of growing up in the same hood,” Corgan goes on of the connection he had with Morello and Jones. “We have had our influence in what followed.

“If they want to get mad at me, they can, but that's not an insane theory. I find it really fascinating, because what was it in the water that we were all drinking?”

Indeed, similarities between the respective trio’s experiences can be drawn. Clapton, Beck and Page will forever be linked by the fact they all had stints in the Yardbirds, before they too embarked down notably differing guitar paths.

Page embraced hard rock with Led Zeppelin, Clapton pursued psychedelic rock and blues through Cream and his solo work, and Beck became revered for his blues rock and fusion style.

Again, the fact these three were all unified by Yardbird tenures that preceded stylistic deviations, is, at least in Corgan’s mind, the same thing he experienced with Adam Jones and Tom Morello.

“The one thing that all three have in common is metal, you know?” Morello says in response to Corgan’s theory. “Adam and I, we were in his truck driving up to the [Judas] Priest shows and the Iron Maiden shows.

“And then I think what's interesting is how that metal DNA appears in all three, but then there's how it branches off.”

While Clapton, Beck and Page only performed together during one magical tour, we have yet to hear what a Morello/Corgan/Jones collab sounds like.

Although, given the news that Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath's final show will play host to a Tool, Rage Against the Machine and Smashing Pumpkins supergroup, it could be on the cards…

Visit Billy Corgan's YouTube channel to watch the full interview.

Steve Lukather never holds back. His honesty and humor are always present in his interviews – which is why a recent AI-generated article has him looking to set the record straight.

“I read an interview I never did, which was culled by AI from several different articles,” Luke tells Guitar World. “The shittiest part was some fucking horrible clickbait thing saying I think all modern guitar players rely too much on technology. I never fucking said that.

“I want people to know that’s not how I feel. Some of the greatest guitar players of all time have come as of late. I’m a fan; I’m not an asshole. When I read that fucking clickbait thing, I was mortified.”

He emphasizes: “I have nothing but respect for my fellow guitar players, whatever the level of technique. The competition is staggering – that AI headline was bullshit.”

Are there any young players who have caught your eye recently?

“Tim Henson’s originality is insane. I would never have approached the guitar the way he does in a million years. And I love the fact that women have stepped up. It’s either you’re good at the guitar, or you’re not; sex has nothing to do with it. It’s exciting to see.

“Kids today start out learning Eruption as their first song – the first thing I ever learned how to play was an E chord! There’s quite a bit of difference in the entry-level of being a musician now, as opposed to 1964 when I was a single-digit kid who could play some Beatles songs.”

There seems to be a rise in reverence for session players like yourself. Why do you think that is?

“Man, we walked in every day, and we didn’t know what we were gonna do. They’d throw up a chart with some letter on it, a few rhythmic notations like a little road map, and we said, ‘Let’s play something.’ There was no rehearsal, no demos, just, ‘What are we doing today?’

“It was a very exciting time in my life, and we were all hungry to do that. We were studying this stuff in high school. People are not made of ones and zeros – we’re flesh and blood who sat in a wooden room doing takes until we got something.

“If we did an overdub, we had to do it in one or two takes because there was no room to do it any other way. It was the old school; maybe the young kids are hearing that when they come to see it live. If I make a mistake, it’s loud and wrong – and I do make them every night!”

Was there ever a time in the studio where you made a mistake with the solo but it ended up on the record?

“Yes! Hold the Line is a great example – that solo up until the three-part harmony at the end was one take. Where it goes into the three-part harmony is where I dicked it. There’s a room full of people and here’s the new kid in the band; there’s all this pressure on me. I ripped the first part of the solo normally, then I made a mistake and went, ‘Ah, fuck…’ But everybody was like, ‘That’s great, keep going!’

What's your favorite Toto solo?

“There’s weird solos I’ve done that aren’t famous. I try not repeat myself, which is hard when you’ve done this for as long as I have. I don’t like playing the same licks for every solo.

“But there’s a song called 21st Century Blues on our last full-length album, Toto XIV, and it was a nice homage to Larry Carlton. I used to write Steely Dan-influenced songs for every one of my solo records because that was a big part of my life. I was heavily influenced by that level of quality, musicianship and craftsmanship.”

You’re heavily influenced by The Beatles too. What’s the most misunderstood element of Beatles guitar playing?

“That’s it’s not guitar playing, man – it’s composition. It’s the composition within the composition. Paul played a lot of the solos, which used to piss George off, but the thing is John, George, and Paul always found something incredibly memorable or hookish to play.

“As a session player, I remember referring to Beatles things when I was searching for parts on other songs. I’d go, ‘I need that sound from Fixing a Hole; that might work here.’ The Beatles were always in the room. Every record I ever made, somebody would say, ‘Give me a little Beatlesy thing, man.’

“Nobody walks away from a Beatles record going, ‘That’s the greatest guitar solo I’ve ever heard.’ You might walk away going, ‘That’s the most perfect guitar solo I’ve ever heard.’ But you’re not walking away ablaze by technique; you know what I mean?”

What was it like playing alongside George Harrison in the early ‘90s?

“I actually got to do it a couple of times. I met George a few days before we were doing a tribute to [Toto drummer] Jeff Porcaro after he tragically passed. I said, ‘Hey, man, I just wanted to say hi and thank you for my career.’ He turned out to be the nicest, funniest guy I’d ever hung out with.

“I know I was cracking him up, and we hit it off. I said, ‘You want to come down to the show? I’ll leave a couple of tickets for you,’ never in a million years thinking he’d take them. So, we’re sitting in the dressing room. The last thing we were going to do was A Little Help from My Friends – the Joe Cocker version, ironically – and I’m at the piano getting the vocal parts down.

“Somebody goes, ‘There’s somebody here to see you.’ I say, ‘Dude, right now? Really?’ They go, ‘I think you want to see him. This guy’s from Liverpool.’ I went, ‘No fucking way.’ The door opens up and George is standing there.

“There were a lot of famous people in the room, but when a Beatle walks into a room, it’s a different vibe, man. It’s a different air. So I gave him my Les Paul – which, just by him holding it, increased its value by a million dollars! I know this because there’s pictures of George is playing it and I got it appraised. Not that I’d ever sell it. My son Trev, a great guitar player, will get it.”

Did you feel some of that same aura while working with Paul?

“Not the same aura – they’re all so unique people. The greatest people, man. You think the most famous people in the world would be assholes, but it’s not the case. They’ve got really great souls, man, and they’re fun to be around. The first time I got to play with Paul was when we did Thriller with Michael Jackson – I was thrilled to be there.”

What was that like?

“It was all cut live. Paul and Michael were in the studio singing live. So I was able to ask every geeky fucking Beatles question about the recordings while we were there for two weeks, having lunch and hanging out. They were just the nicest people.”

Speaking of Michael, Steve Stevens recently told Guitar World that Michael Jackson’s feedback to both him and Eddie Van Halen was that he ‘liked the high notes’. Did Michael give you similar instruction?

“I wasn’t doing solos, I was going parts, so it’s a different vibe. We were working on the middle section of Beat It, and we’d be going at it for 30 minutes, and I said, ‘We’ve got to change it up,’ so that was my addition to it. Michael liked that. The only way I could tell what was happening with Michael and Quincy Jones was when Michael started dancing!”

So most of his communication was non-verbal in your case?

“It was a pocket thing – if I was in the pocket, it was swinging, and he started dancing, and that was the take. If he was looking at me funny… it had to be how he wanted it to feel. But with the solos and the high notes, I could see how he would say that!”

This past fall, you played a cover of Jimi Hendrix’s Little Wing on Jeff Beck’s Strat. What was that like?

“Surreal – so much so that it threw me off completely. I played that guitar at his house many years ago, so you have to look at this from my point of view: here I am at the Hollywood Bowl in front of 16,000 people in my hometown, standing on the stage where Jeff Beck stood, where The Beatles stood, and where Jimi Hendrix stood, probably playing Little Wing too.

“This was toward the end of the set. I think Billy Gibbons had Jeff’s guitar then John Mayer had it [Joe Perry also planned to use Beck's Strat on Aerosmith’s cancelled tour - Ed], and they wanted me to do it. The whole moment freaked me out. You kind of get a brain fart from just being emotional about the actual reality of it.

“All these synapses in my brain hit at once, and it was just a very overwhelming emotion. I’m going to get to play it again in London, I think, in a couple of weeks. I’m not gonna do that song, but I’ll use that guitar to do something else.”

What stuck out most about Jeff’s guitar?

“The reason it sounds so great is because of Jeff Beck, not because of the guitar. It’s a nice Strat, but if you put the thing in the stand, does it make any noise? No. Somebody’s gotta pick it up and play it. Believe me, you put 10 guys out with the same guitar and have them play the same blues lick, and it’s going to sound 10 different ways.

“So you realize that the magic that’s in that guitar is his sweat and his notes. It actually felt like a living thing. Sounds cheesy, right? Jeff was a very important person to me. We were friends and worked together on tours; he was my hero. Who’s the best in the whole world, man? You can’t say; it’s impossible. But who’s in the top five? Certainly Jeff Beck.”

Is it surreal to watch Jeff Beck’s guitars and gear being auctioned off?

“Yeah, especially since I played a lot of those guitars through the years. But I think it’s great for his wife Sandra – you know, she’s gonna get sorted out. Nobody was playing them and she wanted people who would actually play them. That’s why she wanted to take this particular Strat and pass it around to get other people’s love for it.

“I was honored to be one of those guys – and I get to do it again. I’m excited about that, even though I’m a Music Man guy through and through. In fact, I’ve got a new version coming out, the L5. But I’ll cherish the moment. We’re human beings; it’s very emotional for me.”

Can you give any insight into the upcoming L5?

“I always like to have new inspiration sonically and physically. There’s some different pickups in there that are really cool. And it’s got a relic’d thing that I wanted to try that. But I’m not reinventing the wheel; it’s pretty much the same guitar, but we try different little things.”

• Lukather is currently touring Europe with Toto.

Genre-traversing technical maestro Andy Timmons has, self-admittedly, owned “a long chain of guitars,” starting with an Elektra Les Paul he bought in 1976. So, in his Indiana Jones-style search for preloved axes, what was his most incredible find?

“I got a ’65 Strat on eBay that had been really poorly refinished and had some issues with the neck, and pieces and chunks of wood missing,” he tells Guitarist.

“Somebody hadn’t treated this guitar very well – but that made it kind of affordable. The pickups were original and I thought, ‘I can take a gamble on it.’”

Timmons had his luthier strip it down to its core, “past the red refinish down to the original ’burst,” but years of neglect meant he couldn't save the original finish. Instead, the virtuoso decided to take another approach and, ultimately, gave the guitar a total makeover.

“I had him refinish it to look like the white Strat that Hendrix would play or like the one on Jeff Beck’s Wired album cover,” he explains.

“And you know what? It may be the best-sounding Strat I’ve got. It’s just got this thing to it. It turned out to be a good investment because it’s a working guitar that I’ve used on a lot of records and one that I still use quite a bit.”

Just last month, Timmons participated in George Benson's Breezin’ with the Stars guitar camp, alongside fellow guitarists Cory Wong, Al Di Meola, Tommy Emmanuel, and Lee Ritenour, among many others.

Joe Satriani has recruited a host of the world's top guitarists for his G3 tour over the decades – among them, Steve Vai, Robert Fripp, Yngwie Malmsteen, John Petrucci, and Steve Lukather, to name just a mere few. However, there were a couple of guitarists on his bucket list who managed to slip away.

“The one that was so close to really happening was me with Jeff Beck and Billy Gibbons,” he admits in a recent interview on the UCR Podcast. “I think we were a week away from actually putting it in ink in the books. It was so close to happening. Then, Jeff bailed at the last moment.

“He used the excuse [that] he thought it would be better if we toured with Prince. I took that as a really good joke, like, he just didn't want to do it, so he came up with the most ridiculous suggestion.”

In terms of his relationship with Beck, Satch goes on to reveal he can't really say that he knew him, as he only met the late guitar great twice.

“So there was no way for me to ever talk to him about it, like, ‘Why didn't it happen?’” he explains. “But yeah, I've always thought in my mind, ‘Let's call up Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck,’ you know, let's get all of your favorite guitar players out there.”

As for why Beck rejected the G3 gig, Satch wonders whether it could have had something to do with the fact he was from a different generation of guitarists – Beck’s era preceding his and Steve Vai’s, and theirs in turn preceding the “classic rock group” of the likes of Slash and Tom Morello.

“I could see them just wondering, ‘Who is this kid? We don't know who he is. [He] plays instrumental guitar, who cares.’ So I never really thought it would happen, but I'd ask anyway,” he adds.

“Once in a while, somebody would agree or just show up and say, ‘I want to play.’ And it would be [guitarists] like Brian May, Neal Schon, or Robert Fripp. So we've been really fortunate in that respect.”

Satch and longtime collaborator Steve Vai recently announced they would be forming a band together – the first time they've ever done so – with a lineup comprising Pete Thorn on rhythm guitar duties, veteran bassist Marco Mendoza, and drummer Kenny Aronoff.

Last year, Jerry Cantrell flexed his riff-writing chops once again with his latest solo album, I Want Blood – and, for two of those tracks, it turns out he was inspired by Jeff Beck to use an oddball piece of rare gear.

To no surprise, the record’s tones are exquisite, with the Alice In Chains icon's trusty G&L Rampage electric guitar playing a key role. However, beneath the riffs are some weird and wonderful textures at play. For those, Cantrell dug out some old faithfuls, as well as some new favorites.

“There is a lot of Cry Baby and talk box on this record,” he tells Guitar World. “We went heavy with those. We used two different kinds of talk boxes on Vilified and Throw Me a Line. One is the Dunlop that I’ve been using forever, which is just the box on the floor and the tube coming up to the mic.”

The album was recorded at JHOC Studio in Pasadena, California, and a search for more textural goodness saw Cantrell and co-producer Joe Barresi (Tool, Queens of the Stone Age, Melvins) turn to some old clips for inspiration.

“While we were messing around with talk boxes one day, Joe showed me a clip of Jeff Beck with a Kustom The Bag on,” Cantrell continues.

Released in the late 1960s and brought to the stage by Peter Frampton and Steppenwolf's John Kay, The Bag looks like a weird cross between a bagpipe and a talk box. It’s slung over a player’s shoulder with a tube running from a bag to he player’s mouth for wah/talk box tones. Not many were made.

Jeff Beck most notably used it on the Blow by Blow record on the track She's A Woman. The below clip was possibly the one that captured Cantrell’s imagination so vividly.

“It was a different feel, but it was so fucking expressive,” Cantrell says of the clip he say. “I had never seen that clip of Jeff Beck before, and then Joe was like, ‘I’ve got one of these, man. We should try this!’ So he whipped that thing out. I believe The Bag is what you’re hearing on Vilified and Throw Me a Line.”

The record has, understandably, been warmly received by fans, with Cantrell declaring it to be “some of my best songwriting and playing.”

Bass duties are spearheaded by a heavyweight one-two of Duff McKagan (Guns N’ Roses) and Robert Trujillo (Metallica), while Faith No More’s Mike Bordin also features on drums. That essentially saw the Cantrell/Trujillo/Bordin line-up behind 2002’s powerhouse double album Degradation Trip re-unite.

Cantrell had caused a minor stir last year when he declared that his iconic G&L Rampage Blue Dress guitar had been stolen, only to find out it had just been misplaced. It may have seemed an overreaction, but he’s now offered more context to his panic, revealing he once lost an electric guitar that Eddie Van Halen had gifted him nearly two decades over.

He’s also spoken out against amp modelers and has admitted that tracking solos are usually expletive-filled affairs for him.

The final hammer has fallen on the Jeff Beck auction at Christie's, which included over 130 guitars, amps, and tools-of-the-trade that the legendary musician used throughout his quasi-six-decades-long career. With all items sold, the sale generated a total of $10,746,430 (£8,727,284) – which is more than eight times the pre-sale estimates.

“We are thrilled with the results of Jeff Beck’s incredible collection, which pay testament to the legacy of a genius – a globally-revered true rock legend,” comments Amelia Walker, Christie’s Specialist Head of Private & Iconic Collections, London. “Passionate bidders competed for every lot in the sale, with each achieving many multiples of their pre-sale estimate.”

Leading the sale was Jeff Beck's iconic 1954 ‘Oxblood’ Gibson Les Paul, which sold for around $1,315,708 (£1,068,500) – double its initial estimate. It broke the world auction record for the most expensive Gibson Les Paul ever sold – a title previously held by Duane Allman's 1957 Gibson Les Paul, which sold for $1.25 million in 2019.

Speaking of Les Pauls, Beck's 1959 ‘Yardburst’ Gibson Les Paul Standard – which harks back to the guitarist’s days with the Yardbirds – fetched $496,484 (£403,200), smashing its $49,000-74,000 pre-sale estimate.

More records were broken with the sale of ‘Tina,’ the hot pink 1983 Jackson Soloist Beck used on Tina Turner’s Private Dancer album. The iconic guitar, which comes with Turner's switchblade-scratched autograph, was sold for over 36 times its pre-sale high estimate – $14,776 (£12,000) – realizing $543,029 (£441,000) and making it the most expensive Jackson ever sold at auction.

His pedalboard, which was used on Beck’s final tour in 2022, also broke records, selling for $155,151 (£126,000) – well over its initial $3,694-6,156 (£3,000-5,000) estimate.

Other noteworthy sales include Beck's 1990/1993 Fender Custom Shop Stratocaster ‘Anoushka’ – named after the sitar virtuoso Anoushka Shankar – which fetched an astounding $1,241,211 (£1,008,000) (pre-sale estimate: $24,627– 36,940).

Walker cites Anoushka's sale as epitomizing “the power of Jeff’s live performances and the emotional connection between him. ‘Anoushka’ sparked a 9-minute bidding battle, achieving £1,008,000 – 50 times the pre-sale low estimate.”

His custom ‘Tele-Gib’ – the ’59 Fender Tele/Les Paul hybrid with Seymour Duncan pickups – continued to exceed expectations, selling for $853,332 (against a pre-sale estimate of $123,000), while his iconic 1960 Olympic White Fender Stratocaster – the guitar that's, perhaps, most closely associated with Beck – went for around $543,000 (£441,000), having had a pre-sale estimate of approximately $62,000.

The last guitar sold was a Jeff Beck signature Strat, covered with autographs signed by the performers who participated in a tribute concert to the musician at the Royal Albert Hall in 2023, including Eric Clapton, Susan Tedeschi, and Kirk Hammett.

This particular sale had a charitable element to it, as its total hammer price, along with that of the last three lots, was donated to Folly Wildlife Rescue, a charity Jeff Beck proudly supported during his lifetime.

Given the scale of the prices achieved in this auction, it’s perhaps not surprising that no less than three of these lots will be shoe-ins on the list of the most expensive guitars ever sold, with the ‘Oxblood’ a surefire addition – though none will break the top 10.

These astounding figures follow the recent trend we’ve seen with other big-name guitar auctions, where many have gone far beyond their estimates.

The star power, the guitar's provenance and its inherent vintage value, as well as the accumulated wealth that comes as successive generations of rock fans reach their ‘golden years’, has proved a potent combination, driving up prices.

Mark Knopfler's guitar collection sold for a total of $11,227,003 last year, which surprised auctioneers at the time, but it seems the trend won’t be tailing-off anytime soon.

To view the full auction results, visit Christie's.

Most successful guitarists inevitably become guitar collectors, eventually amassing dozens or even hundreds of instruments during their careers.

Many famous and acclaimed guitarists have owned some of the world’s most impressive collections, such as legendary veterans Eric Clapton, David Gilmour, Mark Knopfler and Pete Townshend, as well as relative newcomers like Joe Bonamassa and Slash, who acquired some of the rarest and most highly desirable vintage instruments.

These hoarding proclivities were expertly spoofed in the timeless rock mockumentary comedy This Is Spinal Tap when Nigel Tufnel showed off his guitar collection to director Marty Di Bergi and refused to let Di Bergi even look at a mint, unplayed Seafoam Green 1963 Fender Bass VI that still had its hang tags. But even though actor Christopher Guest based Tufnel on Jeff Beck, this was one of the few scenarios that wasn’t very much like Beck at all.

Beck certainly owned more than his fair share of guitars, but his collection was more about well-worn, used and abused tools of his trade than untouched trophies, consisting almost entirely of items that he played on stage and in the studio on a nearly daily basis.

Recently, Beck’s wife Sandra felt that his guitars had sat idle too long and she decided that they belong in new homes with players who can continue to make music with them.

On January 22, 2025, about 90 guitars and string instruments and various amps, pedals and other music wares from Beck’s collection – a total of 130 lots – will be sold in auction by Christie’s in London.

“These guitars were his great love,” said Sandra Beck. “But after almost two years of his passing it’s time to part with them as Jeff wished. After some hard thinking, I decided they need to be shared, played and loved again.

“It is a massive wrench to part with them but I know Jeff wanted for me to share this love. I hope the future guitarists who acquire these items are able to move closer to the genius who played them.”

The variety of gear in the auction covers the guitarist’s entire career from his early days in the Yardbirds through his final shows with Johnny Depp.

In addition to truly iconic guitars – like his 1959 ‘Yardburst’ and 1954 ‘Oxblood‘ Les Pauls, his custom ‘Tele-Gib assembled by Seymour Duncan, a 1954 Strat gifted to Beck by Steve Marriott and various prototypes of his Fender Jeff Beck Stratocaster signature model – the auction also includes numerous surprises like the Chapman Stick he was seen playing in the late ’70s, various acoustic guitars and Fender basses that he wasn’t known for playing, a 1957 Telecaster signed by the rhythm guitarist for Gene Vincent and His Blue Caps Paul Peek and several lap steels.

Several of the more unusual and obscure instruments were likely gifts given to Beck over the last two decades of his life.

Two highly coveted Klon Centaur pedals are up for bidding as well as the custom J. Rockett Archer ‘klone’ pedals that replaced them in his rig (a very strong endorsement if there ever was one) along with individual pedals, entire pedalboard rigs and even custom Marshall floor wedges.

Numerous Marshall, Fender tweed and Magnatone “Becktone” amps are also in the mix, along with the Fender Princeton II and Twin Reverb II amps he used to record 1989’s Guitar Shop.

The following are a few highlights of the most famous and fascinating items from Christie’s Jeff Beck auction.

c. 1959 Gibson Les Paul Standard (‘Yardburst’)

Along with the ’50s Fender Esquire that Beck bought from John Maus, this Les Paul Standard was one of the guitarist’s most prized acquisitions while he was with the Yardbirds in the mid ’60s. It originally had a sunburst finish, black pickguard and a pair of highly coveted double-cream bobbin PAF humbuckers.

Jeff eventually stripped off the sunburst finish to expose the natural grain and color of its maple top. During the late ’60s, an unscrupulous repairman replaced the cream PAFs with a pair of later-model Gibson humbuckers, which upset Beck and drove him to buy another 1959 Les Paul from future Cheap Trick guitarist Rick Nielsen.

In the early ’70s, after he broke the Yardburst’s neck, a craftsman built a new neck featuring a vintage Gibson logo and L-5-style “flower pot” inlay on the headstock and the initials “J.B.” between the 21st and 22nd frets.

This guitar appeared on numerous important Jeff Beck recordings during the ’60s, including the Yardbirds’ Roger the Engineer/Over Under Sideways Down album, the Jeff Beck Group’s Truth album and the Beck’s Bolero single.

1954 Gibson Les Paul Model (‘Oxblood’)

This guitar enjoys immortal iconic status, thanks to its depiction on the cover of Beck’s best-selling album, Blow by Blow. Jeff bought this 1954 Les Paul from a fan and friend named Buddy Davis in Memphis in November 1972.

The Les Paul had already undergone several modifications when Beck acquired it, which included the replacement of its original P90 single-coil pickups with Gibson humbuckers and a refinish job with a distinctive deep dark brown color that inspired its ‘oxblood’ nickname.

Beck was photographed frequently on stage with the oxblood Les Paul with Beck, Bogert & Appice, and it remained his main instrument through the mid ’70s, featuring prominently on his Blow by Blow album and 1975 tour with John McLaughlin.

In 2007, Gibson made a highly detailed limited-edition replica of the Oxblood Les Paul, and one of the prototypes and a production model are also in the auction.

Custom Tele-Gib 1959 Fender Telecaster

In early 1974, when Jeff was in CBS Studios working on Beck, Bogert & Appice’s ill-fated second studio album, Seymour Duncan approached the guitarist with a custom Telecaster/Les Paul hybrid instrument that he had assembled.

It started as a butchered 1959 Tele with a rosewood neck, but Duncan routed out larger cavities for full-size humbucking pickups and replaced the battered rosewood fretboard with a maple fretboard and installed Gibson Les Paul frets. Duncan cut an early ’50s Tele bridge in half to accommodate a bridge humbucker, and he cut a new pickguard.

Perhaps the most important element of Duncan’s custom Tele/Les Paul hybrid is its pickups. The zebra bobbin neck and dual-cream bridge humbuckers were originally broken PAFs that Duncan salvaged from a 1959 Flying V that once belonged to Lonnie Mack.

Duncan rewound the pickups, in the process creating the prototypes for his JB and JM model humbuckers. The finished guitar was nicknamed the ‘Tele-Gib’ for its blending of Telecaster and Gibson features.

Duncan traded the Tele-Gib for Beck’s iconic Yardbirds Fender Esquire, which Beck bought from John Maus of the Walker Brothers in the summer of 1965. Beck didn’t seem to mind the trade (at first) and later that year he used the Tele-Gib while recording Blow by Blow, most notably playing it on Cause We’ve Ended As Lovers.

Beck also appeared on stage with this guitar during his 1981 performances alongside Eric Clapton for The Secret Policeman’s Other Ball shows and subsequent concert film.

c. 1966-67 Marshall Model 1987 JTM45 MK IV Super Tremolo

If you look closely at photos of Beck’s early concerts with the Jeff Beck Group in 1968 and 1969, you’ll probably notice Beck plugged into one or more Marshall heads with eight control knobs instead of the usual six. These were Super Tremolo heads, and the two extra knobs controlled the tremolo effect’s speed and intensity settings.

This Marshall Super Tremolo head is an unusual and rare early example, housed in a ‘small box’ cabinet and marked JTM45 and MK IV on the front panel. Typically, the JTM45 MK IV designation was seen on the chassis for the Marshall combo model known as the ‘Bluesbreaker’ combo that Eric Clapton used to record the Beano album with John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers.

It’s highly possible that this is the amp that Beck used in the studio to record tracks for the Truth album in May 1968.

1953 Fender Champion 600

Although Beck is usually associated with using loud Marshall stacks on stage like the ones he was seen with in the late ’60s with the Jeff Beck Group, he often used much smaller amps in the studio.

One can’t get much smaller or more primitive than the 1953 Fender Champion 600 seen here, but surprisingly this was his main amp while recording his 2010 Emotion & Commotion album. During this period Beck even performed concerts using small 15-watt Fender Pro Junior 1x10 combos, with his Marshalls only appearing for show.

1977 Roland GS-500 Guitar Synthesizer Controller

Although Beck has seemed like a staunch traditionalist and even a minimalist at numerous points of his career, he could also be wildly adventurous with his gear. One example is the Roland GS-500 Guitar Synthesizer Controller seen here, which appeared on Jeff Beck’s 1978 tour in Japan.

This guitar, built by Japan’s famed Fujigen Gakki workshop, controlled a GR-500 guitar synthesizer, which is not included in the auction. During this period Beck was heavily inspired by Jan Hammer’s guitar-like synth work, so perhaps he adopted the Roland guitar synth to make his guitar sound even more like Hammer.

His guitar synth work can be heard on bootlegs from the 1978 Japan tour where his band included the impressive lineup of Stanley Clarke (bass), Tony Hymas (keyboards) and Simon Phillips (drums).

1983 Jackson Soloist ‘Tina Turner’

For a very brief period in the mid ’80s, Beck was no longer a Strat cat or a Les Paul man but rather he favored Jackson super strat models, like this hot pink 1983 Jackson Soloist.

Beck brought this guitar to the studio when he guested on Tina Turner’s Private Dancer album. At the end of the sessions, Beck asked Turner to autograph the guitar, and she obliged by pulling out a switchblade and deeply scratching her signature into its top so it would be a permanent addition.

Beck also played this guitar at several ARMS benefit concerts and while recording People Get Ready, his reunion single with Rod Stewart.

C. 1960 Olympic White Fender Stratocaster

An Olympic White Strat is probably the guitar most closely associated with Jeff Beck. His first one was a brand-new model that he played during the early ’70s. While he was touring with John McLaughlin in 1975, Beck loaned McLaughlin a Gibson Les Paul Deluxe after McLaughlin’s famous custom double-neck Rex Bogue was mysteriously broken in two.

In repayment for the favor, McLaughlin bought Beck a mid-’60s Olympic White Strat from Norman’s Rare Guitars. This is allegedly the white Strat seen on the cover of Beck’s 1976 Wired album.

Unfortunately, the McLaughlin Strat was stolen after Beck absentmindedly left it in an open-top hot rod while he dashed in and out of the Soho London nightclub Ronnie Scott’s. Beck bought a similar replacement, but that was stolen too by shifty airline baggage handlers in the U.S. while he was on tour. Beck promptly bought a third replacement, which is the 1960 model seen here.

This is the same guitar seen in photos of Beck’s 1978 Japan tour with Stanley Clarke where it had a black pickguard with individual on/off switches for each pickup, which were Schecter models wound by Tom Anderson.

That pickguard is still with the guitar but with Seymour Duncan Quarter Pound pickups, along with a white pickguard with custom pickups that Duncan gave to Beck in 1995. The pickups and pickguard currently on the guitar are its stock Sixties parts.

This 1960 Strat appeared on several Beck albums over the years, including Crazy Legs (1993).

1990 Fender Jeff Beck Signature Stratocaster prototype #2

Although Beck was seen on his 1989 tour playing several custom Fender Strat Plus models that were precursors to his signature model, the very first official Jeff Beck Signature Stratocasters were not delivered to Jeff until early 1990 while he was in the studio working on Jon Bon Jovi’s first solo album.

One of those prototypes was a Seafoam Green model that became Jeff’s main Strat through his 1995 tour with Carlos Santana, and it featured Little Richard’s autograph scratched on its top similar to Tina Turner’s autograph. This prototype is #2 and it is almost identical to Beck’s favored “Little Richard” guitar.

1980 Ibanez Jeff Beck Signature prototype

When Beck toured Japan in 1978, numerous Japanese companies approached him about collaborating on a signature guitar. Two unique Greco guitars given to Jeff in 1978 are part of the auction, but even more fascinating are nine Ibanez guitars that include a “limited edition” variant of an MC-400 Musician model and eight prototypes built during 1979 and 1980 that reveal Ibanez’s various and persistent (but ultimately futile) attempts to woo Mr. Beck.

The 1980 prototype seen here is from the very last run of prototypes made in November of that year before Beck ultimately nixed the project.

With its Fender-style tremolo, unorthodox roller string trees that pre-dated the Wilkinson roller nut he favored about a decade later, pair of humbucking pickups, set neck and white finish, it probably came the closest of Ibanez’s numerous attempts to make a Fender/Gibson hybrid that met Beck’s demands.

However, the relatively complicated controls, which included coil-tap and phase switches, a built-in preamp and active EQ, never seemed to appeal much to Jeff.

1956 Gretsch 6128 Duo-Jet

One of the greatest revelations of the Christie’s auction was being able to finally see the progression of Gretsch guitars that Beck purchased while he pursued the sounds of his childhood guitar hero, Cliff Gallup of Gene Vincent and His Blue Caps.

Gallup’s ax was a 1956 Duo Jet with a fixed Bigsby vibrato, but those are as rare as hens’ teeth. Beck did finally manage to get an exact dead ringer in late 1992, but alas, this was just after he had completed his Gallup tribute album, Crazy Legs.

Other Gretsch guitars in the auction include the 1972 Roc Jet that was his first failed attempt at the Gallup sound, a 1955 Duo Jet with a swivel-arm Bigsby purchased in 1984 that was pretty close – and that Beck used on Crazy Legs – and a red 1963 Jet Firebird that is the same exact year and model as Malcolm Young’s number one guitar.

1990/1993 Fender Custom Shop Stratocaster ‘Anoushka’

Jeff Beck had numerous instruments that he considered his main guitar over his six-decade career, but none sustained that status longer than a Fender Custom Shop Strat nicknamed ‘Anoushka,’ which was his main guitar for 16 years. It earned its nickname when Anoushka Shankar, sitar virtuoso and daughter of Ravi Shankar, autographed it.

Beck used this guitar to record the Who Else!, You Had It Coming, Jeff and Emotion & Commotion albums and to perform hundreds of concerts, including the Red, White & Blues show alongside B.B. King, Buddy Guy, Mick Jagger and others at the White House on February 21, 2012, in front of President Obama.

c. 1950s Mario Maccaferri G40

“This is one of my prized possessions given to me by Jimmy Page,” Beck said in a video shot in 2010 that was included with the Rock ’n’ Roll Party (Honoring Les Paul) DVD.

“It’s the same brand of guitar used by the great Django Reinhardt [actually Mario Maccaferri only designed the Selmer Modèle Orchestre guitar with an internal resonator that preceded the Selmer Modèle Jazz guitar that Django played].

“It’s a fantastic, sweet little thing. You can pick it up while you’re watching TV and noodling around. It’s a nice thing to have lurking around and use as an exercise machine. It has a Django sound.”

Maccaferri developed numerous plastic products during the post-World War II years, including clothespins that sold extremely well and made him a fortune.

He also developed a variety of affordable plastic instruments that included the G40 guitar seen here, which originally sold for $39.95 and was produced from 1952 until 1969. Elderly Instruments acquired leftover surplus stock, which they sold during the ’80s and ’90s.

Stage performance pedalboard, 2022 tour

Jeff experimented with pedals often throughout his career – he was even one of the first British guitarists to use a fuzz pedal when he recorded Heart Full of Soul in April 1965 – but he almost never went whole hog when it came to using pedal boards full of effects on stage.

Even in 1989 when he toured in support of his futuristic, high-tech sounding Guitar Shop album, the only effects he had on stage were a humble Rat distortion and a Boss DD-3 digital delay pedal.

Beck’s pedalboard remained pretty low-key even through 2018 when he usually gigged with nothing more than a Klon Centaur, Snarling Dogs Super Bawl Whine-O wah, Hughes & Kettner Rotosphere and Way Huge Aqua Puss analog delay. However, in 2019 his pedalboard suddenly expanded significantly, and on his final 2022 tour it somewhat resembled NASA’s Mission Control.

Beck’s 2022 pedalboard seemed to be configured to cover any sound from any song from his entire career. There’s an MXR M222 Talk Box for effects from his BBA and Blow by Blow era, an original vintage Maestro Ring Modulator for Wired, a Boss OC-3 Super Octave to fill in for his classic Mu-Tron Octave Divider, a Dunlop MC404 Custom Audio Electronics wah and an MXR M236 Super Badass Variac Fuzz to complete the Sixties- and Seventies-era sounds.

On the more modern side of the spectrum are a JHS VCR Signature PaxAm Modulation (with discontinued Ryan Adams graphics) for chorus and reverb, an Empress Effects Tremolo, Neo Instruments Ventilator II rotary cabinet simulator, MXR M117R Flanger and a Dunlop EP103 Echoplex Delay.

A custom J. Rockett Archer boost/overdrive pedal that was a prototype for the limited-edition Archer Jeff pedal with NOS components replaced the Klon Centaur that even Beck considered too expensive and rare to risk losing or damaging while on the road.

Functional accessories include a Radial Engineering Shotgun guitar splitter and buffer for driving several amps at once or freely selecting individual amps, two GigRig Loopy pedals to provide independent loop switching for his ring modulator, octave, flanger and delay pedals and On Stage LED pedalboard lights.

• Read more: What the auction of Jeff Beck’s best-loved electrics tells us about the late guitar icon
• Jeff Beck: The Guitar Collection goes under the hammer in a live auction on 22 January 2025 at Christie’s in London. For more information, see Christie's

Joe Perry has recalled the time he was loaned a Fender Stratocaster that belonged to Jeff Beck – and revealed that he almost took the instrument out on the road with Aerosmith.

In a new interview with MusicRadar, Perry discusses his friendship and playing relationship with Beck and also talks about playing Beck’s ‘number three’ Strat with his side project the Hollywood Vampires – an appropriate outing for an instrument belonging to the late guitar hero.

“It was his number three [Stratocaster],” Perry explains. “The whole premise of the Vampires was to pay homage to the guys who had passed on. I think we were going to have it on the road with Aerosmith, but when that [the band’s Peace Out farewell tour] got cancelled, I gave it back to Jeff's guitar tech.”

A nightly outing for the Beck Strat on the road with Aerosmith would have been a tempting prospect for guitar geeks and fans alike, but sadly it was not to be following Steven Tyler’s vocal injury and the tour’s subsequent cancellation.

Both Perry and Aerosmith bassist Tom Hamilton have since discussed their hopes that Tyler might recover enough to get back on the road, with Hamilton recently saying, “Maybe Aerosmith will do something in the future, but it’s a big ‘if’.” However, even if that does happen it looks as if Perry’s moment with the Strat might have passed.

“[Beck’s former tech is] the guy helping the family put Jeff's stuff together for the auction,” explains Perry. “I think he might have given it [the Stratocaster] to Billy Gibbons to play just to keep it out on the road. I'm hoping to get a chance to play it again.”

The same Strat seems to have been played by the likes of Gibbons, John Mayer and Steve Lukather since, and Lukather has hinted it’s part of a wider Jeff Beck tribute project.

However, special its association, as Perry notes repeatedly in the interview, what surprised him most about Beck’s instruments, including the loaner, is how unremarkable they were.

“There's nothing special about it except that it was Jeff’s,” says Perry of the Strat. “Whenever I’d see him play live for real it was an off-the-rack Strat. He was never one to say, ‘I’ve got to play that. That’s my number one. That’s the one I can't live without.’ I think that was interesting. He looked at the guitars like tools, not something you get attached to.”

One model that truly would have been worthy of the term ‘remarkable’ would have to have been the off-the-wall and ultimately ill-fated Ibanez Jeff Beck signature guitar that came to light via Guitar World last year – also set to feature in the upcoming Jeff Beck guitar auction.

It can’t have been an easy decision.

In a brief statement about the forthcoming auction of Jeff Beck’s guitars in London, his widow, Sandra Beck, wrote movingly that: “These guitars were his great love and after almost two years of his passing it’s time to part with them as Jeff wished.

“After some hard thinking I decided they need to be shared, played and loved again. It is a massive wrench to part with them, but I know Jeff wanted for me to share this love. He was a maestro of his trade. He never lusted after commercial success. For him, it was just about the music.”

Encapsulated here, in these words of devotion, is perhaps all you need to know about Jeff Beck. Gold discs might have been welcome enough – but, for Jeff, the real riches were in the music. And what music it was.

When it comes to electric guitar, there will perhaps never be such eloquent expressions of yearning as Cause We’ve Ended As Lovers or Where Were You. A matchless maverick; a magician who conjured with six strings and a row of glowing EL34s; a cheerful heretic in the faithless church of chart success. Beck was all these things and more.

But his musical character can also be understood through the guitars he played, which is why we joined a trio of experts from prestigious auction house Christie’s – all of whom worked on the sale for Mark Knopfler’s guitars – to take a tour through Beck’s collection.

We sat down with Amelia Walker, specialist head of Private & Iconic Collections, Christie’s London; Kerry Keane, international consultant and specialist for musical instruments (who was also closely involved in preparing the Eric Clapton and David Gilmour collections for sale); and Caitlin Graham, consultant, Rock & Pop Culture (who also worked on the Gilmour sale), to lift the bonnet of Beck’s most iconic music machines and see where he found all that tonal horsepower…

First up, how much of Jeff Beck’s musical life – as expressed through his guitars – does the sale cover? It seems to form a picture of his whole career, almost.

Amelia Walker: “It really does; it covers his entire career. So, with the exception of some instruments that you know very well are no longer in his collection, like, for example, the Yardbirds Esquire that he famously swapped with Seymour [Duncan] in 1973, there are all the greats that you can imagine from across his career.

“From The Yardbirds, there’s the first Les Paul he bought in 1966, all the way through to guitars that he only acquired for his last tour and that he played on the last tour. So it’s really his entire, almost 60-year-long career. It’s guitars, a couple of other instruments, a ukulele, a violin – that sort of thing – that he had at home, a few basses that he had purely at home. Then amps, pedals, various travelling cases, but all to do with instruments.”

Let’s start at an obvious place with what is arguably the most iconic of all his guitars, Jeff’s ‘Oxblood’ Les Paul.

Amelia: “Well, I’m going to caveat the conversation with the fact that research is still live right now [at time of interview in late November of last year – Ed], so we are still formulating our full picture of these guitars.

“But we can say he was on tour with BBA [Beck, Bogert & Appice] in late 1972. And I think his search for a new Les Paul coincided with the ‘Yardburst’ getting damaged again – because it has had a few fair breaks, that poor guitar. So he was really looking for a guitar that could replicate that fat Les Paul sound. BBA was a loud band and that was their signature [style] – a power trio with a lot of volume.

“So he was passing through Memphis and went into this shop called Strings & Things, where he tried a few things and apparently even signed the door of the back office, according to some accounts, but he didn’t actually find anything that he wanted in the store. Then he contacted a friend of his who he’d met – a young fan, in fact – called Buddy Davis, whom he’d met a few years before and who had taken other guitars to show him.”

“The way Buddy has told the story is that Buddy drove Jeff around various hot-rod shops in Memphis, where he bought things for cars, but in his car he also had his guitar, the ‘Oxblood’, which Buddy had acquired from Strings & Things – the same shop in Memphis that Jeff had visited – where it was on sale because it’d been unwanted by its previous owner. Buddy hadn’t yet paid for it, however. The guitar itself had been owned by another guitarist.

“This guy had taken it into Strings & Things six months previously and said, ‘It’s a Goldtop. I want you to respray the guitar to match my shoes [laughs]. I don’t want these P-90s, either, I want humbucking pickups and I want a slimmer neck profile. Here you go.’ So they [Strings & Things] did all the modifications that we see now. Then, when he went back to pick it up, he decided he didn’t like it any more, and then Buddy Davis walks in, says, ‘I love it.’

“I think he was meant to pay $300 for it, or something, but he took it away on credit and actually hadn’t yet paid for it by the time Jeff called him. So then Jeff buys it directly from Buddy, before Buddy had even paid for it from the shop, and so I think he made a little profit. That’s the legend – and it’s a legend that has changed over the years…”

Caitlin Graham: “A couple of those stories are mixed up, if you read them from both parties, but we confirmed it with the guitar technicians [who were there] at the time.”

Kerry Keane: “As you know, there’s probably not a rock god guitar out there that isn’t wrapped in mythology at some level.”

When did Jeff begin using ‘Oxblood’ in anger?

Amelia: “By all accounts, I think he put it to use almost instantly…”

Caitlin: “It’s famously on the cover of Blow By Blow, but it wasn’t actually used as much as the Strat and, I think, the ‘Tele-Gib’ for the actual recording sessions…”

Amelia: “Yeah, it was used for one or two songs on Blow By Blow.”

Caitlin: “But it was definitely more like his primary performance guitar from that period onwards. There are obviously so many amazing photos of him playing it.”

What’s the general condition of ‘Oxblood’ today?

Caitlin: “It’s still in the condition that he left it. We haven’t cleaned it, which is lovely. It has definitely got an aura to it.”

Amelia: “I think we’ve put one string on because it only had five strings for about 30 years.”

With perishables such as strings, it must be tough to decide what must be untouched for originality’s sake and what absolutely must be replaced for the guitar to be able to be presented for sale.

Kerry: “Correct. It’s a narrow needle to thread. You want to honour the instrument, you want to honour the history, and at the same time it’s merely a static object if it’s not playable.”

Is there anything that leapt out about ‘Oxblood’ as you were preparing it for sale, Kerry?

Kerry: “Without a doubt, you pick this guitar up and you realise that it has been rode hard and put away wet. It’s a well-used instrument. As a guitarist and as a guitar maker, I immediately looked at those first alterations that were made from a Goldtop, fitting it with humbuckers, and how that bridge humbucking pickup is sort of jammed right up next to the wraparound bridge. There’s not even room there for the [pickup] surround; even the surround is bent so it can fit there.

“It was late ’53 when you first started to see these wraparound bridges. When you look inside this guitar, I don’t fully embrace the potentiometers as original, yet the ‘speed’ knobs appear from the period. The capacitors have certainly been changed. I would expect those waxy looking ‘grays’, and there has been quite a bit of rewiring, which is to be expected with all the alterations.

“Though the neck on the guitar is not as thick and as chunky as you would expect from the ’54, and for the simple reason that that neck has been replaced at some point. It’s certainly cobbled together. But at the end of the day, it’s a great-playing axe, no doubt about it.”

Were you able to determine what the pickups were? Are they PAFs or something other?

Kerry: “Both the pickup chassis are patent numbered. We didn’t fully pull them apart, but they’re exposed all-blacks and I’d say original ‘T-Top’ bobbins – one with worn gold-plated adjustment poles and the other chrome-plated poles. With that being said, they are certainly a married pair of humbuckers.”

Let’s move on to the other big Les Paul in the collection – the ‘Yardburst’.

Amelia: “Yeah. The great thing about the ‘Yardburst’ is you can kind of see him making decisions of what he wanted to change, step by step through his very early career. So he takes the pickguard off. Then takes the switch surround off. Then he takes the pickup covers off. Then he takes the finish off [laughs].

“All these things happen, but it was clearly used to record various tracks on Beck-Ola, I think. It was used to record Beck’s Bolero. That’s probably the most significant thing to note. The ‘Led Zeppelin that never was’ band, which I think is very cool.

“Then I think it was still very much a main guitar for him through both Jeff Beck groups. Only when it got damaged and the neck got completely repaired, with the inlay and the new headstock… Even after the pickups were stolen out of it, or removed from it, by an earlier restorer in the late ’60s, he was still using it. It was a very, very loved guitar.”

Your thoughts, Kerry? What’s your perspective on this one, as opposed to ‘Oxblood’?

Kerry: “Again, both double blacks in there…”

Amelia: “I think they’re patent‑granted ones.”

Kerry: “Yeah, they had patent numbers… and late‑60s style chassis screws. The potentiometers and ‘Bumblebee’ capacitors all look original to ’59.”

Amelia: “The PAFs were taken out in 1968, I think. Actually, that was Seymour Duncan’s reason for wanting to make Jeff the ‘Tele-Gib’ because he felt so sad for Jeff that he didn’t have PAFs any more in a guitar that he owned, that he wanted to create something for him. Which I imagine is your next question…”

Well, yes, that’s a good moment to segue to the ‘Tele-Gib’.

Amelia: “I think from when we spoke to Seymour – who’s a lovely man – he really, genuinely wanted to create something for Jeff that Jeff would like to play. He knew that Jeff loved the lightness of the Tele body but wanted the fat sound of the Gibson and the fat frets. I think he put Gibson jumbo frets in the fingerboard; the body and the neck are effectively one date, the same guitar, but he just redid the fingerboard and put new, big frets in.

“Jeff loved the guitar, I think. By all accounts, he thought it was a great-sounding guitar. He used it straight away on Blow By Blow, in Cause We’ve Ended As Lovers. So, yeah, it’s a unique ‘Frankenstein’ from that point of view. And the pickups that [Seymour] made for him also had their own story in that they’d come out of a Flying V that used to belong to Lonnie Mack, who Jeff also loved.

“Seymour said he rewound them, but they were effectively those pickups, so they are PAFs. Then they, themselves, formed the basis of what Seymour then developed as his own JB and JM model pickups.”

There’s an interesting split personality thing with Jeff Beck, between his love of Fenders – especially his finely expressive playing on the Stratocaster – and the more muscular playing he did with Les Pauls. Do you feel that that’s reflected in the collection, those contrasting facets of his musical personality?

Amelia: “There’s a variety. There are definitely a lot of Strats because the Strat was his tool, particularly in the last 25, 30 years, but he’d definitely got the range [of sonic tools available to him], I’d say.”

Kerry: “When you look at his collection as a whole, you can see here’s a virtuosic player who played his instruments to destruction. Really, he played them hard, and when they were played out, he moved on to another. There are these epochs of performance periods where he has dialled into one instrument specifically, and when that instrument literally gets played out, he’s moving on to something else…

“I thought about this. He’s a lot like Les Paul and so it’s no great surprise to me that Les Paul was one of his heroes. Jeff Beck is always looking to change [and enhance] tonal quality, constantly. He’s always searching for a new sound, and being inventive in the way he produces that sound, either physically with the guitar or by incorporating different circuitry and electronics. It’s never-ending.”

Caitlin: “I don’t think he played anything that was standard [laughs]. I think he loved hot-rodding cars and he loved hot-rodding guitars. But I think the Les Pauls are very much tied to his earlier career. Then, when he started switching to Strats, that was it; it was true love with the Strats.

“That was his primary tool after that, partly inspired by Jimi Hendrix. And I think he’s quoted as saying that the Les Pauls made him sound like somebody else. It was a great sound, but he didn’t 100 per cent feel himself with the Les Pauls. With the Strats, it was his true voice.”

Amelia: “I’d say that the one instance where he comes back to Les Pauls is when he’s paying tribute to Les Paul.”

Caitlin: “Yes – although he definitely never gives up the Les Pauls completely, or the Gibsons as a whole.”

This might be a good point to discuss the ’54 Strat that’s in the sale. In our experience, original first-year-of-issue Strats – which were almost working prototypes early on – can sound more bright, edgy and hot than the classic Strat sound we know and love today. What’s this one like?

Kerry: “From my [examination], I think it’s from later in ’54 and so we’ve got a guitar, I think, where those contours are really coming into play.

“Though you’re right: the tonal quality of the early Strats sounds tonally parallel to what you’d hear from a Telecaster. That’s the type of sound that Leo’s customers wanted – it was that twang, without a doubt, and with a very hard bite. So that’s not surprising at all to me.”

How did this particular guitar come into Jeff’s ownership?

Amelia: “The date is slightly opaque at the moment, but he got it after a particularly hard session with Stevie Marriott, who gave it to him. I think, by Jeff’s own account, he went back a couple of days later to check [that Marriott was still okay with this arrangement], and it was still his. When he got it from Steve Marriott, it had a Tele neck on it, which he then took off and put an old [Strat] neck that he already had onto it.

“So he had a maple Strat neck that he’d used throughout the Jeff Beck Group that had been on a stripped Strat body with a broken pickguard horn. You’ve probably seen the photos of it, but he then took that off and put it on the sunburst Strat. I think the ’54 was actually his most prized possession. He took it straight out on tour in ’77, ’78. It’s photographed extensively. He used it to record most of There And Back, the 1980 album.

“Then it makes an appearance at some various, quite big shows in London: the Secret Policeman’s Ball in ’81, and the ARMS Tour for Ronnie Lane in 1983, where you see Eric, Jimmy [Page] and Jeff all on stage together for the first time. But then, I think, he didn’t want it to get stolen. He suffered from so many guitars being stolen in the ’70s that, after that, I don’t think it goes out very much, if at all. I think it stays at home.”

Caitlin: “Yeah, he very much was not precious about his guitars, and definitely saw them as tools, but he seems to have been slightly more precious about this one, although perhaps not at the beginning because we have seen photographs of him using it as a pogo stick! But at some point he decides that it’s his pride and joy and doesn’t want to let it out of his sight and out on tour. He actually replaces it with a reissue that he starts using live.”

Kerry: “What’s interesting is that so many players work with three tremolo springs [in their Strats]. But Jeff Beck, who was a master of bending tone and sound with the tremolo, left all four springs in there. Which makes it, as you know, so much more of a physical endeavour.

“You listen to a recording and it’s all so wonderful, but then you start to watch videos and film clips of him playing, and how smooth and quick and tactile he was with his right hand, working controls and the tremolo. It’s like it happens in a flash and he has changed the timbre of the instrument.”

Many of the guitars have been modded in rather idiosyncratic ways to suit Jeff’s musical needs. Do you think the collection paints a portrait of a man who wasn’t a collector per se but who acquired guitars pragmatically?

Amelia: “Yeah, I think he got them when he needed them. It was very pragmatic.”

Kerry: “I think, of all the collections I’ve worked on, Jeff Beck more than anyone else viewed these instruments truly as just tools; they weren’t precious at all. With David Gilmour’s magnificent collection [which Kerry prepared for auction in June 2019], he was very curatorial in how he approached it.

“The same with Mark Knopfler, the same with Eric Clapton. But with Jeff Beck, no. It [the guitar] was a tool; it was a means to an end. It was how he completed his musical journey – by getting the right tool and doing it.”

The pink Jackson – as incongruous as its pointy headstock may seem in this company – is probably another example of that.

Kerry: “Yes, a true Californian pointy guitar, as you say….”

Amelia: “He was given it by Grover Jackson at the ARMS concert in Madison Square Garden in 1983, when they took the tour over to America.”

Caitlin: “But he had actually said that he had that as the spare for the Steve Marriott vintage Strat… He got the pink Jackson to use on the road because he didn’t want to get the Marriott Strat damaged.”

Amelia: “It got a lot of use in that period of ’83 to ’85 – it got a lot of use on sessions with other artists. It has a Kahler bridge that I think enabled him to do more [finely expressive] bends.

“I think I remember reading somewhere that he said that the Marriott Strat was like a beauty: it sings to you if you get it right, but it had a habit of going out of tune. Then, of course, Tina Turner signed it with a flick knife after he recorded for her in London. Then they all went out to dinner [laughs].”

In more recent years, of course, Jeff settled into more of a regular pattern of using white Strats built to his preferred spec – and there are a number of those in the sale. Do these later Fenders settle on a particular spec or do they indicate his evolution of tone was ongoing at the time of his passing?

Caitlin: “Yes, he used different white Strats and different tunings for different songs. So there are actually a number of opportunities for bidders to acquire a Jeff Beck white Strat because there’s more than one.”

Amelia: “They’re very different from the signature series [production models], I would add, and they were all Custom Shop-built for him with a nut [design] that doesn’t exist on the signature series, and often they are reverse headstock – or there’s a marriage of an earlier style of neck that he’d had made in the ’90s by JW Black with a Todd Krause body because he liked the pairing. So there are a lot of interesting combinations in those as well.”

Kerry: “And [non-standard] wiring harnesses. Again, the guitar techs were switching parts back and forth.”

Caitlin: “That’s one thing that has been quite tricky for us in putting this together – he definitely switched necks around a lot. And he had a number of guitar techs over the years, so the stories have [been verified with] various different guitar techs along with the various different modifications, and getting to the bottom of exactly the history of each guitar was quite a journey.”

Kerry: “What was brilliant of [Jeff’s tech] Steve Prior was that he wrote on the back of the pickguards what was changed, when it was mounted and where. So there’s this wonderful story to be told whenever you pull one of the pickguards off of the Strats [that Steve worked on].”

Amelia: “Sometimes Jeff did it himself [laughs].”

• Jeff Beck: The Guitar Collection goes under the hammer in a live auction on 22 January 2025 at Christie’s in London. For more information, see Christie's.

Though he turned down an offer from John Mayall to join his prestigious, often career-making, Bluesbreakers band, the late Jeff Beck still found himself, early in his career, in the shadow of the most famous Bluesbreakers alum by far, Eric Clapton.

In early 1965, Clapton had come to the Bluesbreakers from the Yardbirds, the latter of which Beck did join, as Clapton's replacement.

Beck's more anarchic tendencies would subtly make their way into the Yardbirds, while Clapton began his much-recounted journey into blues-rock immortality – from Mayall to Cream.

Though the direct, and inevitable, comparisons between the two faded with time, they were relentless as Beck began his Yardbirds tenure, and colored the early stages of what would eventually become a rich friendship.

Speaking to Guitar World in 2010, Beck explained that his early view of Clapton was just as much (if not more) defined by Clapton's already-legendary reputation than it was by the man himself.

“I joined the Yardbirds in February of ’65, and I’d never seen sight or sound of Eric with them before that,” he explained.

“My only connection to him was hearing the rest of the band talking about him, that he used to do this, that, and the other. I got pretty pissed off with it, like, ‘Shut up, I’m here now!’ For the first couple of weeks, all I heard was, ‘Oh, Eric, the girls love him in this place,’ and I’d say, ‘All right, enough of that!’”

Clapton was – as Beck pointed out – glad to be out of the Yardbirds fold, and had no enmity toward his successor in the band. At least on the surface.

“Right when I joined the Yardbirds, they had a massive hit with For Your Love, which Eric detested and was the reason he left the band,” Beck recounted. “So we were off pummeling around the States on a three-week promo tour.

“When we went back [to England], by pure chance I bumped into him in a club and I thought we were actually going to get into a fight! But when he saw me, he went, ‘Hello, man!’ and he gave me a big hug, and that was the end of that.”

That said, many, many years later, Clapton revealed that there was a bit more going on emotionally than that warm greeting indicated.

Clapton told Rolling Stone in a joint interview with Beck in 2010 that he had “mixed feelings” about his Yardbirds successor at the time.

Pride and ego, Clapton readily admitted, played no small part.

“He was my replacement in the Yardbirds. I mean, there shouldn’t have been a replacement. That was why I left: ‘I’ll leave, and the whole thing will collapse without me.’ In fact, they got better with Jeff and became more successful.”

“To be absolutely honest, I wanted to be as critical of him as I could,” Clapton elaborated. “It hurt me bad because I could see they were getting, with Jeff, at something beyond what I was capable of. His thing was so unique and advanced.”

Beck himself wasn't long for the Yardbirds, and after some moderate successes he helped write the modern instrumental guitar rulebook with two hugely successful and influential solo albums in the mid-'70s, Blow by Blow and Wired.

This trajectory hardly resembled that of Clapton, who had evolved from blues-rock fire-breather to chart-topping, Strat-wielding pop-rock star. And yet, Clapton's presence still lingered over Beck, if less ominously.

“I was subservient to him [Clapton] when I joined the Yardbirds, because he was such a big ‘face’ there,” Beck told Guitar World in 2010. “But when I developed my own wacky style with the Yardbirds albums, I didn’t feel in any way that I was encroaching on his patch at all, nor have I ever since then, along with when [producer] George Martin came along for Blow by Blow and Wired.

“George gave me the confidence to play on an instrumental album, and at that point I was absolutely cleared from any kind of ‘direct’ challenge to what Eric was doing, or anyone else for that matter, in terms of clashing styles.

“And yet, I think Eric wanted to be the guy associated with the guitar, which he subsequently became,” Beck elaborated. “You stop anybody on any street, around the world, and they know who Eric Clapton is. They don’t know who I am! But we’re going to change that, aren’t we? [laughs]”

Competitiveness non-withstanding, the two shared the stage at a pair of charity concerts in the early '80s, and would later tour together in 2010.

Reflecting humorously on the tour in 2010, and Clapton's stature within the guitar community as compared to his own, Beck told GW, “Playing these shows with Eric was like going back into the school playground, but this time I was the hero instead of being beaten up every night!

“It was a great feeling, like going back to visit a bunch of old friends, with the license to play as you wish as opposed to a ‘traditional’ way, along with the guy that is the boss. Eric is definitely the boss.”

When you’ve got Rhonda Smith’s killer combination of Larry Graham-like funk chops, a full-on fusion background, the ability to play just about any kind of bass instrument imaginable, and sheer stage energy, word gets around.

For more than a decade, Smith was on call with Prince, but during the Purple One's 2010 sabbatical, she got a call from Jeff Beck drummer Narada Michael Walden. Unsure of Prince's future plans, Smith went with Beck, and had to tell his purple majesty she was busy when he got his mojo working again.

“They're both amazing guitar players,” Smith told Bass Player. “Prince was aware of everything; he could play everything, and had control over everything, so the bass needs to play a supportive role all the time, but Jeff let you take liberties. That was more of a rock and fusion gig, so there's room to expand.

“It doesn't mean I couldn’t go crazy. If I was screwing up, he would tell me, but he really trusted the people that he picked.”

Born in Halifax, Nova Scotia and raised in Montréal, Rhonda Smith first encountered the bass clef in elementary school, where she played the tuba-like euphonium.

At age 12, her older brother brought home a Sears bass guitar, and soon she was playing along with rock records by Yes, Rush, and Mahogany Rush. A year later, she was exploring fusion through the basslines and solos of Stanley Clarke's Rocks, Pebbles and Sand.

“Stanley was a huge influence because he had his own sound and was upfront in the music. Alain Caron and his band UZEB made fusion popular in Canada at the time, and of course, Jaco had a big impact on me.”

Our interview from the Bass Player archives took place in February 2012, with Smith having recently returned from a world tour with Jeff Beck.

Jeff Beck is one of the most technically gifted guitarists of all time. How do you relate to him in a performance?

“I can really relate to Jeff's playing because he doesn't use a pick, and neither do I. I'm a big believer in the sound of skin on strings. But the guy is so bad [in a good way] that I'll admit at times I have to not listen to his solos when we play live, because I'll lose my concentration. I prefer to study him at home in my studio.

“I listen to tapes of rehearsals when we're just blowing over stuff, looking at what dimension he's coming from as a soloist.”

What bass do you use as the workhorse with Jeff Beck?

“I do most of the show with the same kind of bass I used with Prince – a 4-string Fender American Deluxe Jazz Bass. I wanted to respect what had been laid down before me, and I knew Jeff would respect that. I use it in active mode with both pickups engaged, volume pegged, and just a bit of bass boosted.

“I love to play 5-string, but I haven't incorporated it yet because of my experience with Prince and Lenny Kravitz – they're not lovers of 5- or 6-string basses. I think some guitar players simply want you to play a 4 because they don't want all that other stuff in the way.

“I play my Vektor Electric Bassett electric upright on the few ballads, such as Over the Rainbow and Nessun Dorma – anything that's got room for people to hear the wood and the vibrato – in order to bring something more tender to the table. It's the same one I took on tour with Prince.”

Are you playing any fretless?

“I played some a couple of tours ago. I still have a fretless Deluxe Jazz on tour, but the songs I used it on, which are still in the set, have changed in such a way that I don't really need it anymore. I just roll back my tone knob and use the bridge pickup on the fretted Fender to cop somewhat of a Jaco-style sound.”

On Freeway Jam, you alternate between fingerstyle and some serious double thumbing. How do you apply that technique within your overall plucking-hand concept?

“I probably would be better off if my thumb was curved like a real bass player's thumb, but mine is very straight. So I've developed what I call a ‘top and bottom’ approach, where I strike down on the top of the string with tip of my thumb, and then I strike the bottom of the string on the way back up from underneath. Then I might incorporate some muted hammer-on notes with my left hand.

“I might add more action by plucking a higher string with my index finger – sometimes I use my first two fingers. And sometimes I'll thumb up and down on a string while I keep the plucking going on a higher string. Sometimes I'll even add a flamenco-like flick of all of my right-hand fingers on the G string.”

How has Prince influenced your bass playing?

“I don't think I could have had a better teacher. Canada was light on R&B and funk in the clubs and on the radio. From the outset he schooled me on a lot of music – guys like Larry Graham, James Jamerson, and Chuck Rainey.

“Plus, he's a phenomenal bassist – if he wants you to reproduce a feel, he comes over and plays it for you, so you need to be able do it on the spot!

“It's not something you can cop immediately, but by watching him over the years and being in such a funky environment, I've been able to assimilate some of his style. I think I play less and with more taste now, and I'm much more confident.”

Over 130 of Jeff Beck's guitars, amps, and ‘tools of the trade’ are set to go under the hammer in London on January 22, 2025, as part of Christie’s Jeff Beck: The Guitar Collection. The sale features some of Beck's most-used guitars throughout his six-decade-long career, spanning from his Yardbirds era to his last tour in 2022.

Commenting on the decision to sell his prized possessions, Jeff Beck's wife, Sandra Cash, said, “These guitars were his great love, and almost two years after his passing it's time to part with them, as Jeff wished. After some hard thinking, I decided they needed to be shared, played, and loved again.

“It is a massive wrench to part with them but I know Jeff wanted for me to share this love. He was a maestro of his trade. I hope the future guitarists who acquire these items are able to move closer to the genius who played them.”

As expected from the instruments of such an esteemed guitarist, Beck's guitars are anticipated to fetch hefty prices. The sale is led by one of his most recognizable guitars – his iconic 1954 ‘Oxblood’ Gibson Les Paul.

This heavily modified Les Paul, estimated to sell for between £350,000 and £500,000 ($442,000–$632,000), was purchased in November 1972 in Memphis.

It saw extensive action throughout the 1970s, most notably in the power trio Beck, Bogert & Appice, and during his performance alongside David Bowie and Mick Ronson at London’s Hammersmith Odeon in July 1973.

However, it's best known as the centerpiece of the cover of his 1975 album, Blow by Blow, and for being one of the four guitars he used to record this seminal record.

Another storied Les Paul in the collection is the so-called ‘Yardburst,’ a 1959 Gibson Les Paul best known for its role during Beck’s Yardbirds era. Now estimated to sell for up to £60,000 ($75,791), the guitar was originally purchased for £175 at Selmer’s in Charing Cross, London, in early 1966.

It was used on many key recordings, including Over Under Sideways Down, from The Yardbirds' 1966 album, Roger the Engineer, the epochal Happenings Ten Years Time Ago, his Jimmy Page-co-written solo track Beck’s Bolero, and his debut studio solo album, Truth.

It also saw heavy onstage use in 1968, including the Jeff Beck Group's famous residency at The Scene in New York, where nightly encores saw Jimi Hendrix join Beck and his band on stage.

The Tele-Gib is another Beck staple included in this auction. This hybrid guitar, put together specifically for Beck by Seymour Duncan, comprises a Fender Telecaster body and neck, with a pair of Gibson PAF humbucker pickups extracted from a Flying V. It's expected to fetch between £100,000 and £150,000 ($126,318 and $189,477).

Duncan brought the guitar to Beck while he was rehearsing with Beck, Bogert & Appice in London in late 1973. Eventually, it found its way onto Cause We’ve Ended as Lovers, from Blow by Blow, and was used in the 1981 benefit show The Secret Policeman’s Other Ball alongside Eric Clapton.

Beck’s 1954 Sunburst Fender Stratocaster was a gift from Humble Pie’s Steve Marriott and became one of his most prized possessions. It's now expected to sell for somewhere in the £50,000-£80,000 ($63,159-$101,054) range.

Beck replaced the existing Telecaster neck with a 1958 Stratocaster neck, turning this guitar into his principal performance and recording instrument throughout the late 1970s and early 1980s, including the majority of the 1980 album There and Back.

‘Tina,’ a Pink Jackson Soloist – estimated to sell for £8,000-12,000 ($10,105-$15,158) – debuted during the 1983 ARMS benefit concert at New York’s Madison Square Garden. It was used in several important recording sessions, including those with Tina Turner – thus its nickname. Famously, Turner engraved her signature on it with a flick knife and then rubbed in green nail varnish for longevity’s sake.

Another highlight is Beck’s longest-serving Fender White Stratocaster, ‘Anoushka.’ Master-built by J.W. Black of the Fender Custom Shop, it features a neck that Beck favored, paired with a white Stratocaster body.

Named ‘Anoushka’ after sitar virtuoso Anoushka Shankar, who signed it for him, this guitar became his primary recording and performance instrument for 16 years – used to record four solo albums and in hundreds of shows, including Beck’s 2012 performance at the Obama White House alongside B.B. King and Mick Jagger. It's estimated price tag? Somewhere in £20,000-£30,000 ($25,263-$37,895) range.

Highlights from this sprawling collection will be on public view in Los Angeles from December 4 to 6, followed by a showing of the full collection in the pre-sale exhibition at Christie’s headquarters in London from January 15 to 22, 2025.

For more information, head to Christie's.

The following is a fan-submitted Q&A with Jeff Beck that was first published in Guitar World in 2010.

He is held in the highest regard by Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page, was close friends with Jimi Hendrix, and his mid-Sixties recordings with the Yardbirds invented the sound for heavy metal guitar. But what Guitar World readers really want to know is...

On your new album, Emotion & Commotion, how did the idea evolve to record with a 64-piece orchestra? – Albert Shorofsky

“I was listening to an interview that I did way back in 1966 with Brian Matthews, the guy that ran the Saturday Club radio show in England, and there was a clip where he asked me, ‘What would you like to see yourself doing in the future?’ and I said, ‘I’d like to play with a big orchestra.’ [laughs] I couldn’t believe that – even way back then, I was thinking about doing that.

“At the time, I’d seen Tina Turner and heard the amazing sounds of the Phil Spector productions that featured big, powerful string sections, and the orchestral sounds on other pop records, too. I thought, ‘There couldn’t be a better backdrop for some kind of powerful music than a big orchestra.’ My wish to hear how a guitar would sound in front of an orchestra has always been there.

“Recently, I did a version of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony for an album that I hope to be accepted by EMI Classics. They said they loved it and wanted 12 more pieces, but it took so long to learn the Fifth and get it right, I imagined it would take another six months to get the rest together. So I took the idea and, in order to make it a little easier on myself, I chose somewhat simpler melodies that could be rattled off fairly quickly just to see if it worked, and everyone seemed to like the results.

“For the new album, I originally wanted to present two CDs in the box, with Emotion, the orchestral stuff, on one disc, and Commotion, the stuff with the band, on the other. I went into the studio one day and [producer] Steve Lipson had sequenced the orchestral and band tracks together. He said, ‘What do you reckon?’ and I said, ‘It sounds all right to me. Let’s carry on!’

“Every time I walked into the studio, I wouldn’t remember what I’d done the previous day, and there was no kind of rhyme or reason to what was going on until he started to sequence some of the demos together. We forced it together. The ingredients were pleasing musical pieces but there was no preconception to it, and it just happened.”

The orchestral works on the new album sound fantastic and are reminiscent of the track Diamond Dust, from Blow by Blow. Would you say there is a connection between Emotion & Commotion and Blow by Blow? – Leroy Ray

“This new album is not dissimilar from Blow by Blow in terms of the approach, where it was done in a ‘seat of the pants’ kind of way. When nothing’s planned, that’s when the results seem to happen. I don’t organize myself sufficiently to get an album of material together, book the studio, and go. I need to be kicked; I need to be forced physically to go in. That’s how it works for me. I’ll get a great idea in the house, and it’ll stay there unless somebody comes and drags it out of me!”

One of the most ambitious tracks on Emotion & Commotion is your presentation of Nessun dorma, from Puccini’s opera, Turandot. Also, you share the melody of Elegy for Dunkirk with opera singer Olivia Safe. Are you a classical music fan? – Bruno Curreri

“Around the time I did my recording of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony, I was looking for some other pieces to record. One that I liked very much was Ravel’s Pavane, so I learned that, and I was listening to what they were playing on the Albert Hall Prom [the Henry Wood Promenade Concerts].

“Every year they have a prom, which is a big music festival. I’m looking away from rock and roll into proper, serious melodies, and, for me, it has been a good playground to look into. And Pavarotti never ceases to amaze me; the bellowing – the big, deep, proper opera singing – is something I love, and I was keen to try Nessun dorma, which he sang magnificently. My guitar is not a voice, and it’s not his voice; I played it like a spirited, bluesy thing. That’s what I was trying to do: make the guitar do things it’s not supposed to do.”

Your latest DVD, Performing this Week… Live at Ronnie Scott’s, features a set list that spans your entire career. Does each of those songs have a special meaning for you? – Irene Coco

“When I first went out with the band with Tal [Wilkenfeld] and Vinnie [Colaiuta], we were short of new material to play, so I thought, ‘Why not do a quick trip back through time, and put some of the early stuff in there?’ Albeit without Rod [Stewart].

“We did People Get Ready and stuff like that. I think it added up to quite a good journey back through history, so anyone that hadn’t seen me got a snapshot of what was going on back in ’66 and ’68. As opposed to bombarding people with brand-new, avant-garde techno, I thought it would be better to establish a foundation for people to hear, and it seemed to work.

“Two of the songs at the start of the set, [John McLaughlin’s] Eternity’s Breath [from 1975’s Visions of the Emerald Beyond] and [Billy Cobham’s] Stratus [from 1973’s Spectrum], I played because I want people to realize that music was around, plus it’s still fun to play.

“I’m just a messenger for John on those songs, because I want people to listen to him. If people enjoy my version of it, then my job is done. John is so far ahead of his time – he really is. He’s not half as well known as I’d like him to be. Those songs are played with the most heartfelt respect. Nowadays, to really sort out the men from the boys, John plays mostly acoustic, which cannot be bluffed.

“Billy Cobham’s Spectrum album gave life to me at the time, on top of the Mahavishnu records featuring [keyboardist] Jan Hammer. It represented a whole area that was as exciting to me as when I first heard Hound Dog by Elvis Presley. They were inspirational to me to the point that I started to adopt that type of music.

“Tommy Bolin’s guitar playing on Spectrum is fantastic. What a sad loss; he was on the tour when I was out with Jan in 1976, and Tommy died after the first night of the tour in Miami. I heard the news the next morning.”

You are currently on tour with fellow British guitar great Eric Clapton. As the guy that replaced Eric in the Yardbirds, was there ever any animosity or competitiveness between the two of you? – Hilary Franceschi

“Playing on this tour with Eric has been a very happy turn of events. First of all, I think he actually likes me after all these years, which is heart-warming. I didn’t realize he detested me quite so badly until he revealed that recently in Rolling Stone. [laughs] He said we were enemies, but that was more on his side.

“I was subservient to him when I joined the Yardbirds, because he was such a big ‘face’ there. But when I developed my own wacky style with the Yardbirds albums, I didn’t feel in any way that I was encroaching on his patch at all, nor have I ever since then, along with when [producer] George Martin came along for Blow by Blow and Wired.

“George gave me the confidence to play on an instrumental album, and at that point I was absolutely cleared from any kind of ‘direct’ challenge to what Eric was doing, or anyone else for that matter, in terms of clashing styles. And yet, I think Eric wanted to be the guy associated with the guitar, which he subsequently became. You stop anybody on any street, around the world, and they know who Eric Clapton is. They don’t know who I am! But we’re going to change that, aren’t we? [laughs]”

You’ve always played with a wonderful type of aggression, throwing wild sounds at the audience in a way that says, ‘Deal with this!’ Where does that attitude come from? – Angelo Barth

“It’s like a tantrum. Those things are outbursts, like exactly what I wanted to do to the teachers at school. It’s a bottled-up frustration that manifests itself in those outbursts, as well as a reflection of my life and my reaction to the difficulties of it. Singers are like that when they start screaming, like Screaming Jay Hawkins [Beck covers Hawkins’ I Put a Spell on You on Emotion & Commotion]: One minute he’s singing perfectly normally, and then all of a sudden he bursts into rage. Love it.

“I like an element of chaos in music. That feeling is the best thing ever, as long as you don’t have too much of it. It’s got to be in balance. I just saw Cirque du Soleil, and it struck me as complete organized chaos. And then there was this simple movement in the middle of the show, which was a comedy, and I thought, ‘What a great parallel between the way that I think and the way this circus is happening.’ It had a special meaning for me, aside from the spectacle of it all.

“When I came away from it, I thought, ‘If I could turn that into music,’ it’s not far away from what my ultimate goal would be, which is to delight people with chaos and beauty at the same time.”

Can you describe the feeling of sparring with Eric Clapton on a nightly basis? –Sherwood Meara

“Playing these shows with Eric was like going back into the school playground, but this time I was the hero instead of being beaten up every night! It was a great feeling, like going back to visit a bunch of old friends, with the license to play as you wish as opposed to a ‘traditional’ way, along with the guy that is the boss. Eric is definitely the boss.”

There were so many incredible guitar players in England in the mid Sixties – you, Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, Mick Taylor, Peter Green... Were each of you very aware of one another’s careers, and did you play together often? – Hugh Finsecker

“Mentally, there was some subliminal connection between all of us, wondering what one another were doing, but physically, no, we were not around each other very often at all. Eric lived not very far away from me at the time, and Jimmy lived not very far away, either, but I hardly ever saw Jimmy until I got him into the Yardbirds as the bass player. England being so small, many people think we all lived in Buckingham Palace together [laughs], but in fact we saw each other very rarely.

“I joined the Yardbirds in February of ’65, and I’d never seen sight or sound of Eric with them before that. My only connection to him was hearing the rest of the band talking about him, that he used to do this, that and the other. I got pretty pissed off with it, like, ‘Shut up, I’m here now!’ For the first couple of weeks, all I heard was, ‘Oh, Eric, the girls love him in this place,’ and I’d say, ‘All right, enough of that!’

“I didn’t see him until about a year later, because we were off to America. Right when I joined the Yardbirds, they had a massive hit with For Your Love, which Eric detested and was the reason he left the band. So we were off pummeling around the States on the three-week promo tour.

“When we went back [to England], by pure chance I bumped into him in a club and I thought we were actually going to get into a fight! But when he saw me, he went, ‘Hello, man!’ and he gave me a big hug, and that was the end of that.”

Back in 1983, when you and Eric appeared together for the ARMS [Action into Research for Multiple Sclerosis] Benefit for Ronnie Lane, Eric was quoted as saying, “Jeff is probably the finest guitar player I’ve ever seen.” Was that actually the first time the two of you ever played together? – Paul Montgomery

“Wow, good Lord – did he really say that? I’m deeply honored. Before ARMS, we had only done the concerts with John Cleese and Monty Python [The Secret Policeman’s Ball, in 1979, and The Secret Policeman’s Other Ball, in 1981] so the ARMS concert was one of the first times Eric and I ever played together in front of an audience. We did a few things right after that, too, such as Amnesty International [in 1985].”

In the mid Sixties, John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers were a band that served as a training ground for some of Britain’s best blues guitarists, such as Eric Clapton, Peter Green, and Mick Taylor. Did Mayall ever ask you to join the Bluesbreakers? – Alex Durant

“He did. John called my mum several times. He found my mum’s number, and she said to me, ‘Oh, that John Mayall sounds very nice!’ [laughs] But I didn’t want that – I didn’t want to be playing blues all of the time. I’d seen Eric with them, and he was fantastic, really.

“He did the job better than I could have, and I just didn’t want to have that challenge. My musical taste was changing radically from 12-bar blues. I might have done better in that band than in the Yardbirds, but I certainly would not have been given the same kind of free rein to do the experimenting that I did in the Yardbirds.

“John Mayall came to see me with the Yardbirds at some gig. He was very straightforward. He never embellished or gave us any flowery comments about the gig. He said, ‘The audience loved it, but there was not much blues, was there?’ And I thought, ‘Excuse me, but this isn’t a blues band.’ It sort of was, but he’s a purist and he was listening for Little Walter–style harmonica solos.

“I didn’t want to be mimicking Chicago blues musicians forever. My thinking was, ‘We’re not them, we’re not black, we’re British middle-class kids and let’s get on and do our own music.’ We had a bit of disharmony about that, but not to take away from John’s dedication to it.”

In the late Sixties in the States we were all very aware of a British blues explosion, but was there a sense in England that the music was really expanding, and that what came next – the musical adventurousness of Cream and Jimi Hendrix – was on the horizon? – Kate McCrae

“For me, the first shockwave was Jimi Hendrix. That was the major thing that shook everybody up over here. Even though we’d all established ourselves as fairly safe in the guitar field, he came along and reset all of the rules in one evening.

“Next thing you know, Eric was moving ahead with Cream, and it was kicking off in big chunks. But me, I was left with nothing. That was the hurtful part, because I didn’t have anything to come back at them with.

“Time went by, and I scraped by with Cozy [Powell, drummer for 1971’s Rough and Ready and 1972’s Jeff Beck Group albums], and luckily enough I got with BBA [Beck, Bogert and Appice, in 1973], which was a power trio. That helped, because they were so enthusiastic, and it was like Cream on acid! Then George Martin comes in and we start mellowing down a bit and making more ‘classy’ sort of music, I suppose you could say, with [1975’s] Blow by Blow.”

In the late Sixties and into the early Seventies, jazz legend Miles Davis was incorporating more of a rock approach. He was known to tell his guitarists, “Play like Hendrix.” Was there ever an offer of any kind for you to play or record with Miles? – Harry Booth

“In my mind’s eye, he was, and still is, so far up there in the world of jazz. He’s in a gold-plated place. Miles was one of those natural spirits that let the musicians do what they wanted to. On the Tribute to Jack Johnson album [1971, featuring guitarist John McLaughlin], you can hear John pushing a lot, and I think it was a great slight-of-hand on Miles’ part to get the vibe from someone else and then sit on top of that. There’s sort of a recirculating power going on.

“I would have loved to have had the chance to play with Miles, but it was never brought up. I don’t know if he even knew who I was. If he were to come back, I’d definitely knock on his door.”

I’ve read about Jimi Hendrix coming every night for a week to jam with the Jeff Beck Group at the Scene Club in New York City. Can you describe what that was like and your relationship with Jimi? – Charles Pizer

“We did six nights in a row there [in June 1968]. The initial gig that broke us in America was at the Fillmore East with the Grateful Dead. But after that success and the great write ups, we then had to go down-market at a small club for six nights. It gave everyone a chance to watch what they had just seen again, six times in a row. We didn’t really want to be scrutinized like that, in case we just happened to get lucky the night we played the Fillmore, which was quite good.

“The first night at the Scene, Jimi didn’t show up, but he came for the rest of the five nights. Around about the halfway mark, he’d come in from whatever recording he’d been doing. The buzz was incredible: the place was packed anyway, but when he came in they were standing on each other’s shoulders.

“Sometimes he didn’t have his guitar, so he would turn one of my spare guitars upside down and played that way, and I actually played bass at one point. I’ve got a photograph of that. Thank god someone took a picture, because there’s hardly any record of those goings-on.

“Around that time, Jimi and I played a secret gig, a benefit at [drug rehabilitation center] Daytop Village. Jimi drove me up in his Corvette… that was the best moment. His driving was terrible. We were stuck in traffic in the middle of New York City, and he had this brand-new 427 Corvette boiling over, and I thought, ‘I hope it doesn’t blow up right here!’ [laughs] I was thinking, ‘Why did you buy a Corvette in Manhattan?’

“I wasn’t looking for compliments, but before I met Jimi someone told me that he knew all about my recordings with the Yardbirds. He had to, because for someone so utterly flamboyant and played so inventively, I knew he was one for listening out. He wasn’t one of those staid, insular kinds of blues players; he would listen to everything. And that alone thrilled me.

“He’d also seen the Yardbirds live in 1965/1966 when he was playing sideman to Little Richard, I believe. It was amazing to see him play, and I’d met him before I saw him perform. I saw him at this tiny little club in London, with all of these ‘dolly birds,’ which is what they called girls dressed in their miniskirts. I think they all thought he was going to be a folky, Bob Dylan–type of character [laughs], and he blew the place apart with his version of Like a Rolling Stone.

“I just went, ‘Ah… this is so great!’ It overshadowed any feelings of inferiority or competitiveness. It was so amazing. To see someone doing what I wanted to do… I came out a little crestfallen, but on the positive side, here was this guy opening big doors for us. Instead of looking on the negative side and saying, ‘We’re finished,’ I was thinking, ‘No, we’ve just started!’

“I was delighted to have known him for the short time that I did. It was the magical watering hole of the Speakeasy, the club where we hung out in London, that enabled that to happen. It was the one place you could go and be guaranteed to see Eric or Jimi and have fun playing. Those places don’t seem to exist anymore.”

You’ve mentioned in past interviews that your guitar playing has been inspired by vocalists. Has your playing also been influenced by other instruments, such as the pedal-steel guitar, because of the use of the slide and the volume control? – Vincent McDowall

“Absolutely, yeah. I do a very poor man’s pedal steel on the Stratocaster. The people I listened to were [steel player] Speedy West with [guitarist] Jimmy Bryant. Unfortunately, the actual physical layout of the steel guitar makes it very difficult to recreate on a regular guitar. But it doesn’t stop one from listening to it and embracing some of the style. There’s a guy now, Bruce Kaphan, who is amazing.”

Your tribute to Les Paul at this year’s Grammy Awards was a show stopper, with your spot-on recreation of Les’ sound and style on How High the Moon with Imelda May. Can you talk about Les’ influence on you as a guitar player? – Dan Holland

“Les is sadly missed, but he had a great life and he gave us so much more than just the guitar. I’ve always been a huge fan, and his guitar playing inspired me a great deal. I was glad to have had the chance to get to know him. This spring, I’m going to be doing a tribute to Les with Imelda at the Iridium in New York City, and I’m really looking forward to it.”

When Carmen Vandenberg last spoke with Total Guitar she was still undecided as to what she wanted for her touring pedalboard – but what she did know was that this was no fly-in setup, a drive, a delay and a reverb pedal to get through a quick set.

No, she was going all-in, mooting two 'boards. While she likes to shake things up a bit, to cover the different electric guitar tones required to get through a set with Bones UK or Morrissey, there were going to be some ever-presents that are non-negotiables – including one overdrive pedal with great sentimental (and tonal) value.

“A few of my classics are always just going to stay on the 'board,” she said. “Jeff Beck gave me his gold [J Rockett] Archer, based on the Klon. And the octave, the Micro Pog. All of that can never leave. I’m probably gonna do two different pedalboards this time. The tap-dancing becomes a bit tricky.”

Now her Bones UK rig has been finalised. We’re going to offer you a guide to the nine most important effects on her 'board, why they’re there and what they’re for.

1. DigiTech Whammy

This is a perennial favourite of creative guitarists, from Steve Vai and Tom Morello to Sean Long of While She Sleeps. In Bones UK, Carmen uses it for their 2021 track Boys Will Be Girls, where she uses the two-octaves-up setting for some radical bends.

2. Dunlop Joe Bonamassa Cry Baby wah

The copper treadle and subtle signature in the rubber foot grip give this away as a Bonamassa wah. It’s just an authentic vintage wah pedal sound with a switchable true bypass, the most common modification for stock Cry Babys.

3. J Rockett Archer iKon

This gold Archer is special because it lived in Jeff Beck’s ’board before he gave it to Vandenberg. The Archer was one of the first and most respected pedals to closely replicate the Klon Centaur circuit in a small and comparatively affordable format.

The Archer Ikon gets extra close to the Klon by using the same diodes, offering slightly smoother overdrive than the regular Archer. While many users prefer the Klon as a clean boost with the gain at 0, Carmen uses it with the gain at 3 o’clock.

4. Pigtronix Octava Micro

Like the Octavia Hendrix used on Purple Haze, this generates an analogue octave effect that is clearest when playing above the 12th fret on the neck pickup. Unlike Hendrix’s Octavia, the fuzz is switchable, so you can have the octave with or without fuzz.

5. MXR Super Badass Distortion

Carmen never sets her amps entirely clean. They’re always slightly broken up, but she can get a clean sound by picking more lightly. All the dirt pedals are used to push the tone further into distortion. She tends to use the different drives individually rather than stacking them, so the gain is set fairly high on each

6. MXR Analog Chorus

With Morrissey, Carmen uses much more extreme chorus settings than Slash, another Analog Chorus fan. Where Slash has the depth at about 1 o’clock, Carmen puts it closer to 4 o’clock. Slash also cuts the high frequencies as much as possible, whereas Carmen only subtly reduces the high cut (top right) from its maximum (flat) setting.

7. EarthQuaker Devices Organizer

This cunningly titled pedal emulates an organ. Other Organizer fans include Idles’ Lee Kiernan and the Vaccines’ Freddie Cowan.

8. Mooer Audio ShimVerb

Carmen’s CV30 signature guitar amp does have reverb, which she keeps on at a low setting. The pedal is only for when a washy sound is needed, hence the quite heavy spring reverb setting she has here.

9. EarthQuaker Devices Astral Destiny

A reverb with modes that pitch-shift the reverb tail up or down, the Astral Destiny allows expansive and ethereal tones.

The sub mode setting used here adds a lower octave to the reverb tail, filling out the low end. The left footswitch, labelled ‘stretch’, doubles the length of the reverb tail and temporarily shifts the pitch, allowing even more other-worldly tones.

• Soft is out now via Sumerian.

Jeff Beck remains one of the most influential electric guitarists in the history of the instrument. His ever-evolving style has captivated listeners with incredible sonic effects, beautiful phrasing and dramatic solo statements.

Unusually for one of the British blues-rock guitar heroes, many of Jeff’s tunes featured advanced chords and harmonies, and his music attracted world-class jazz musicians including Jan Hammer, Vinnie Colaiuta and Jason Rebello. While not being a trained jazz player, Jeff had an amazing knack for negotiating these complicated structures in a superbly natural style.

There is a huge difference in approach between Jeff’s early playing and that shown later in his career. He started off playing fixed bridge guitars but the change to using a Fender Stratocaster with a whammy bar heralded a reinvention of his approach.

Stevie Wonder wrote the classic song Superstition for Beck but was prevented from giving it to him by his record company. Stevie went on to write Cause We’ve Ended As Lovers for Jeff, which became a signature song (and is the most cited ‘favourite instrumental’ in GT’s monthly Q&A). The song was a gift to Jeff for playing on Stevie’s classic album Talking Book, and actually features a Telecaster rather than the Les Paul featured on Blow By Blow’s cover.

Coming from the ‘Surrey Delta’ which spawned such British guitar elite as Jimmy Page and Eric Clapton, it’s no surprise that Jeff was a deeply rooted blues musician. But he was also heavily influenced by guitarists such as Cliff Gallup and Les Paul, and you can hear these elements in his playing.

In addition to these influences, he experimented with many different kinds of grooves from soul and R&B to modern dance styles and even some arrangements of classical music (check out his stunning version of Puccini’s Nessun Dorma at Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Festival).

The way in which Beck made his solos service the broader musical message was impressive; it never sounds like he’s showing off, it was all about making a beautiful contribution to the song. In the examples I’ll show you some of his arsenal of techniques.

The short pieces here often utilise the vibrato arm, so apologies to those of you that don’t have a guitar with this appendage. However, you could learn a lot by trying to adapt these ideas by replacing the whammy bar scoops, doops and bends with regular bends and prebends. This can sound new and exciting, a bit like slide or pedal steel, but of course those with a vibrato-equipped axe will especially have great fun this month, too.

Get the tone

Amp Settings: Gain 9, Bass 7, Middle 4, Treble 7, Reverb 5

Jeff manipulated his guitar’s volume pot to get a clean tone out of a driven amp. He used an overdrive pedal and ran his amps hot to achieve the sustain that he needed. Jeff didn’t use a pick, which provided a fatter sound and probably aided his mastery of the Strat’s controls. Use your bridge pickup, set your gain (or pedal) high, and add some lush reverb.

Example 1

We begin our examples with a combination of legato articulation and faux slide playing. At the end of the first beat of bar 2, let the two notes ring together with a little waggle of the bar to approximate slide guitar vibrato, or if you have a fixed bridge add some wobble using your fingers.

Example 2

Again we’re going for a faux slide sound. In bar 2’s triplets, let the bar back up to pitch as you pull-off to the 5th fret.

Example 3

Here’s a classic JB idea of hitting a harmonic and using the bar to play a melodic line. This takes a degree of practice, so try fretting the destination notes before attempting to play the line with the bar.

Example 4

Here we’re using the bar to play melodically by mixing Mixolydian and Blues scale sounds (R-2-3-4-b5-5-6-b7).

Example 5

Here’s a workout with the whammy bar - sorry fixed bridge players! Note the use of the chromatic notes, notably the b5 and bluesy b3rd.

Example 6

In this solo you’ll find some faux slide ideas and a few of Jeff’s other tricks like his famous flutter – flick the bar upwards after hitting the note to create this ‘gargle’ effect. With this much gain and this many technical effects it’s important to mute unwanted string noise using the available flesh of both your hands. Enjoy!

Steve Morse has become the latest guitar hero to pay tribute to Jeff Beck by serving up a stirring rendition of the late guitar great's signature track, Cause We've Ended As Lovers.

“I apologize for what's about to happen,” says the former Deep Purple guitarist before launching into the performance, which was hosted on the American Music Supply YouTube channel.

Armed with his Blue Burst Ernie Ball Music Man signature guitar and his new small-but-mighty and feature-lavished 20-watt Engl head, Morse adopts a tone that is tender and pulled back, yet punchy enough to let his pinch harmonics scream and wrung-out notes soar.

A quirky string mute can be found at the nut of his guitar. The virtuoso's virtuoso crafted the handy gizmo to help him adapt his technique having suffered with arthritis.

Despite the purring beauty of the cover, Morse looks almost relieved as its final notes twinkle and fade, such is the difficulty of nailing both Jeff Beck’s unique playing style, and the tune that demonstrates his famed technique so masterfully.

It's a song that has been taken on by some of the best players in the world, from Eric Clapton and Gary Clark Jr.'s stirring duet to Joe Bonamassa and John McLaughlin. Marty Friedman also once covered the song – and had to perform it in front of Eddie Van Halen.

Many of those players have previously spoken about the challenges that come with covering the song, and the difficulties in emulating Beck's unique touch.

“Beck is a peerless role model,” noted Friedman. “His touch is inimitable; you would have to literally live his life and go through his experiences to play like that. And then you would need a master’s degree in unique techniques that he invented and polished over the years.”

As such, it’s understandable why Morse was seemingly so daunted by the prospect. But, thanks to his delicate harmonics and faithful intro volume swells, he’s come out the other end in style.

From founding the Dixie Dregs to becoming Deep Purple's longest-serving guitarist and beyond, Morse's career is full of highlights. At one point, he had retired from playing completely to become an airline pilot, but was practically forced back onto the stage by Lynyrd Skynyrd and has never looked back since.

For much of his long career, Jeff Beck dedicated himself to instrumentals, working only with occasional guest vocalists. All that changed with 2016’s Loud Hailer, when he grabbed the fledgling Bones UK for a triumphant return to song-based rock.

Asked about working with Beck, Rosie Bones doesn’t hesitate. “I can’t put into words how honoured that I am to be part of his journey and his legacy in some way. It was a small way but to be part of that in any way.”

But calling it a “small way” is too modest. After meeting Carmen Vandenberg at Roger Taylor’s birthday party, Beck attended a Bones UK gig with his wife and immediately recruited the duo to make an album.

The list of vocalists to have recorded with Jeff Beck is short, and not since 1972’s final and self-titled Jeff Beck Group album had one singer delivered an entire album. For Carmen, the claim is even more impressive: she is one of only five guitarists, besides Jeff himself, to have played on a Beck solo album.

Loud Hailer was a clear statement that Beck was not content to stay in the past. A return to driving funk rock, it retained elements of the electronic experimentation he had begun on 1999’s Who Else and 2003’s Jeff. In his TG tribute to Jeff Beck, Aerosmith’s Joe Perry singled out Loud Hailer as a career highlight. “Yeah, Joe’s told us that before,” Carmen smiles modestly. “He said it was one of his favourite records. It’s beyond flattering.”

When we ask about Beck directly, Carmen pauses. “First of all, I miss him so much. Jeff and I would make our morning coffee with our guitars on. That man never stopped playing all day, and listening and trying to be inspired, whether it was from classical music, or Rosie and me. Anything that he heard or saw, he would try and incorporate it in his playing.”

“What did we learn? I mean, everything is learned from that the time,” Rosie adds. “Jeff influenced us in more ways than you can even possibly imagine. It was very apparent that we were kindred spirits.

“We definitely all had the same sensibilities and the same sensitivities. So I think that maybe is one of the reasons why we were all drawn together, in some cosmic way. He really respected vocalists, and obviously, he was incredible to work with.”

“Within this record, we decided to allow space,” Rosie continues. “There’s a lot of pressure to do radio singles and to cut things short. You know, you’ve got two bars for the solo, and then you get out of it and we’re back to a chorus.

“And a big decision, which is definitely influenced by Jeff, is just letting it breathe. Like, the outro needs to be as long as it needs to be, and Carmen needs to be able to express herself freely without feeling like she’s got two bars to whack in as many things as possible. There’s a song called Blood which has a really long outro. There’s quite a few of them. We just let her dictate how long that should be.”

Carmen recalls: “The first time I went to his house, he sat me in front of a ton of amps, no pedals or anything, and gave me a guitar. The test was, he would put me through each one of the amps, and he wanted to see if I could get my tone no matter what he put me through or how he set it. Because technically, your tone is all on your fingers and the way you play, and you’ve got some control with the guitar itself.

“But, you know, Jeff would always sound like Jeff no matter what you put him through. That was his test. I was 23, so I was intimidated. I was so scared, but I passed the test. Pedals and gear, it’s all fun and games, and it’s interesting to find unique styles that haven’t been done, but you need to be able to play with nothing in my opinion, and that’s something I learned from Jeff.”

Rosie adds: “Another thing that we wanted to do on this record was really allow Carmen to have the space to feel like she can express herself on guitar. That’s definitely from Jeff. And a lot of the solos, the way that she played, you know, those real long, sustained notes – it’s that simplicity that he had.

“His simplicity, I think, was his key. He wasn’t a big showy player. He could do it, but his simplicity to just hold a note and be confident for that to be it. I definitely hear that in Carmen all the time. When he played the guitar, it would sing. He would sing his melodies, his light and shade. I think it’s influenced Carmen so much.”

Summing up Jeff’s impact on them both, Carmen concludes: “It’s just his curiosity. His never-ending curiosity to want to do something that hasn’t been done before. That’s beyond inspiring.”

• Soft is out now via Sumerian.

The original concept for this lesson was going to be ‘Some Useful Vocabulary For Slide Using Standard Tuning’ – or words to that effect.

Then I happened to have a play over the backing track using the whammy bar, instead of a slide, and realised I was channelling (or trying to channel) something like Jeff Beck’s solo in Jon Bon Jovi’s Blaze of Glory. Jeff was extremely adept with a bottleneck, but he could also manipulate the whammy to get a slide effect when the mood took him.

The four examples shown here were played separately but with the intention of forming a complete solo when listened to together. There are a few fundamentals to take care of before you dive into these examples, so take note.

I’m taking for granted that your vibrato bridge, whatever style it is, is set up floating (as opposed to flat against the body), with at least a semitone rise in pitch on the second string when you pull up on the bar.

You’ll also want a newish, properly stretched set of strings and a well-cut, lubricated nut, otherwise the constant retuning will hinder any progress. Unless you’re using a locking vibrato, you’ll probably find you need to keep retuning anyway!

A fairly well-driven tone with plenty of mids and not too much bass is also essential. Using a classic overdrive pedal (such as a Tube Screamer or Boss SD-1, or a Klon, if you’re feeling flush) really helps with the sustain you need while using the bar.

I also dialled back the tone on the bridge pickup a little for a mellower attack on the first two examples. Using the picking-hand thumb and fingers helps control noise from the other strings and makes it easier to adjust the guitar’s controls as you play – something Jeff did frequently. Hope you enjoy and see you next time!

Example 1

This first example repeats the same rhythm and a similar technique with the bar for the first three phrases. After the initial sustained note, the first two notes of each group of semiquavers are generated by pressing the bar down until the note drops a tone.

Be as accurate as you can, but remember that perfection might not have any character. The scoops into notes also help give the slide effect. In the final bar, things change up a bit with the brief semitone pull-up on the bar, followed by a nice easy divebomb.

Example 2

The first phrase here features selected notes from a D major chord/arpeggio being dropped down a tone, with the bar in this case, but it’s something you’ll often hear done with a slide.

We continue to bar 2 with some slightly more conventional playing. A scoop, another quick semitone pull-up and a short pentatonic flurry lead us to a divebomb at the end, simulating how many slide players end a phrase – but not before a wobble with the bar. You’ll notice the note is also slid down with the fretting hand to maximise the effect.

Example 3

The dynamic picks up here and this is reflected by the shrill unison bends that start the phrase.

This is followed by a flirt with G Mixolydian (noting the hammer-on at the end of bar 1) and a D major arpeggio, with another semitone pull-up on the bar, then a couple of whole-tone dips at the bottom of the D major arpeggio that leads into bar 2.

A more conventional (but hopefully still useful) pentatonic lick takes us through bar 3 before returning to a lower D major arpeggio embellished with a tone dip on the bar and a quick sus4 reference at the end.

Example 4

Holding a doublestop bend with a floating bridge can be tricky, but it isn’t impossible if you compensate by pushing the whole thing slightly sharp with your fretting hand. The idea behind this is to simulate the rapid-fire licks available to slide players using open tuning but then changing to a more country style for bar 2.

Bar 3 is basically the setup for the harmonic in bar 4, but there is some aggressive vibrato and a hammer-on from nowhere to spice things up. The final G harmonic is pulled up to A via the bar, before the final dive. String noise here is encouraged!

Hear it here

Jeff Beck – Live At Ronnie Scott's

Of all the available formats, our recommendation is to lean towards the DVD/video. The classic Where Were You is, of course, a benchmark for whammy bar technique, but check out Jeff combining bar and bottleneck flair on Angel (Footsteps) and Nadia, plus what can justifiably be described as a mindblowing cover of The Beatles’ A Day In The Life.

Guest appearances from Imogen Heap, Joss Stone and Eric Clapton enhance an already attractive package.

Jeff Beck – Guitar Shop

Released in 1989 after a four-year hiatus, this was the first album on which Jeff dispensed almost entirely with the pick and showcased his extreme dexterity with the whammy bar.

Behind The Veil, Where Were You and Two Rivers are all great examples of this. They also demonstrate how he would interpret an often simple-sounding but deceptively tricky melody in his own style – not necessarily ‘flash’ (pun intended) but undeniably slick and unique.

Jeff Beck – There & Back

Jeff was always ahead of the curve, as this album from 1980 shows. Many guitarists were unsure about where to go at this point, with many forsaking their hard-won skills to try to assimilate themselves into this new era.

However, Jeff came into the '80s with a collection of contemporary sounding tunes and an approach that the ensuing decades have shown to be ahead of its time. Check out Star Cycle, The Pump and The Final Peace to hear what we mean.